During weekends in Indiana, backpacks are being filled food not books to provide for children whose families don't have the means to buy meals for the weekend.
The weekend backpack project is initiated by fifth graders at Franklin Elementary School. Their task is to prepare bags of food every Friday so that the needy and less fortunate will have food to eat during the weekend, they call themselves the "Backpack Council".
The council is made of up about 300 students who aims to provide 190 food bags each week. Daily Herald said, teacher Susan Mills and her students were able to assemble 120 packs this week already and are needing more. "We need about 70 bags today," Mills stated. Not only did they prepare and provide the food, the kids are also learning to be responsible citizens. Different departments in their food drive are handled by the students as well, like the assembly, food packing even the delivery department. Mills also make sure they only pack healthy food "Each bag was filled with two servings of macaroni and cheese; one applesauce; three small packages each of jelly, peanut butter, and crackers; and bread or boxes of crackers."
The Weekend Backpack Program is not limited to Franklin Elementary School. FeedMore organization also supports this project which aims to collect more food backpacks every week. According to FeedMore organization, they initiated the Weekend Backpack Program because they have seen children who go to school on Mondays lacking a complete meal from the weekend. This has been the driving force behind their project which is now receiving support from everywhere.
The group shared, "The BackPack Program is one of FeedMore's major initiatives to ensure that children in need have balanced, nutritious food they need to learn and grow. The concept is simple: children at risk of weekend hunger receive a bag of food that is child-friendly, nutritious, nonpreshable, and easy to prepare/eat. Each BackPack offers enough food that children can easily assemble into six healthy meals over the weekend when schools are unable to provide breakfasts of lunches".
FoodMore food bank are still accepting groups who would want to donate and join the weekend backpack project. Interested to be a partner? Find the details here.
