Red Nose Day Grant Feeds Hungry Kids, Supports the BackPack Program
Food Bank of Northwest Indiana is proud to be a partner of Red Nose Day USA, helping to end childhood poverty and provide hunger relief in our community. Red Nose Day is all about making it fun to come together to raise money and awareness for children who need our help most—in our community, across the country, and around the world.
London is an elementary student receiving weekend meal assistance from the BackPack Program. About taking home a bag of food each weekend, she says: “I feel great and feel like it’s helpful because Mom, me, and my whole family is thankful for it. It fills us with joy.”
More than 50,000 young students in Lake and Porter County rely on free and reduced price meals during the school days—and for many of these young people, those are often the only meals they’re guaranteed to have. So when weekends and holiday breaks come along, many of these children can’t count on that daily nutrition to give them the energy they need and too often go without until school resumes on Monday.
The BackPack Program works to bridge that meal gap for students by ensuring they have access to enough good, nutritious food for the weekend. Before every weekend or holiday break during the school year, students will receive a bag of snacks and meals for the weekend, including kid-friendly foods like single serve cereal packs and shelf stable milk, fruit cups, microwave pasta, healthy snacks, and other safe, easy-to-make options.
“The BackPack Program does a great job of providing that immediate nutrition assistance to kids who are struggling with hunger at home,” said Steve Beekman, executive director of the Food Bank of Northwest Indiana. “We are fortunate to have the support of committed partners, like Red Nose Day, to help ensure children in our community have the nutrition they need to thrive every day.”
Learn more and get involved at rednoseday.com.
