Impact of BackPack Buddies at YE Smith Elementary
YE Smith Elementary Museum School Principal Cassandra Fogg shares how BackPack Buddies has positively impacted students at her school:
YE Smith Elementary Museum School Counselor Sherine Vernon testifies to the BackPack Buddies program's positive impact on students at her school:
"YE Smith Elementary Museum School has been a recipient of our BackPack Buddies program for approximately one month. The Inter-Faith Food Shuttle and its donors provide BackPacks that are filled with six nutritious meals for the weekend. Currently, we have 25 families that are benefiting from this program."
"One may ask, 'How does this program help the students?' The students are eager to get the bookbags. When I walk into the classroom their faces light up and they ask, 'Are you bringing my bookbag?' When they see me in the hallway they are waving and beaming."
"There is a difference in their behavior. Recently, one of the recipients asked me: 'Will we be getting bookbags for Thanksgiving?' So, we see that it is a necessity. When a child asks in advance it tells that she is thinking and trying to ensure her needs are being met."
"I also have other students and parents to inquire as to how they can become involved. With the amount of bookbags available we aren’t able to add anymore families at this time. However, the hope is that in the future that may change. We are grateful and appreciative of the efforts of the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle. Thank you for the support you provide to our children."
You can bring hope and joy into the lives of some kids in the Greater Triangle by providing for this basic need. Join the team of BackPack Buddies supporters by volunteering, holding a food drive, or donating ($35 feeds a child for a month) to help hungry kids just like those at YE Smith.
Dinner plans tonight? Eat at NOFO and support the Food Shuttle!
If you are trying to decide about what to do for dinner tonight, why not grab some family or friends to enjoy a wonderful meal at NOFO in Five Points? 10% of tonight's sales will be donated to Inter-Faith Food Shuttle!! NOFO will serve dinner from 5:30-9:00 with early bird special prices on Spaghetti Dinner served with a meat sauce, side salad and garlic bread. Appetizer and entrée specials in addition to a half price bottle of wine special are generally offered as well.
Food Shuttle staff- Katherine, Amanda, and Matt- will be at NOFO this evening where you can learn more about the Food Shuttle and any volunteer opportunities! Hope to see you there for a fun night!
Banana Pancakes!
NC State student Chelsea Phillips was a part of a Community Nutrition class this semester. She was an Operation Frontline class instructor for the Avent Ferry United Methodist Kids Up Front class. A couple weeks ago the class made this yummy Banana Pancake recipe! Read Chelsea's recap from the class and try out the recipe below! It’s Banana Pancake time!! The children voted last week that we should make banana pancakes this week and they were really excited about it as soon as they walked in the door. This week we learned the importance of grains and how fiber is used in our bodies. Everyone got a kick out of trying to picture bread “cleaning” out our system.
This week we decided to cook our meal first so that we could teach them more effectively on what they had just ate in terms of texture, satiety, and taste. We had a bread tasting activity with 5 or 6 types of breads. The children had never had breads such as rye or potato bread and they really enjoyed it. We discussed that grains actually came from the grass! They were shocked to think that their pancakes came from a grass!
Banana Pancakes
- 1 Cup whole wheat flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
- 2 egg whites, whipped
- 1 cup evaporated skim milk
- 2 medium, very ripe bananas
1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, and cinnamon.
2. In a small bowl, mash the bananas. Mix in the milk and whipped egg whites. Pour banana mixture into the flour mixture and mix well.
3. Coat a large, non-stick frying pan or griddle with no stick spray. Warm the pan for 2 minutes over medium heat.
4. Spoon ¼ cup of the batter onto the heated griddle for each pancake
5. Cook until the tops are bubbly and the pancakes are dry around the edges. Flip and cook for 2-3 minutes.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until all batter is used.
Recent Hunger News
A couple weeks ago, we posted an entry on the blog that discussed the Food Shuttle's response to the growing number of Americans who are food insecure according to USDA's recent hunger report. The numbers are truly heartbreaking, and folks have started to see how hunger is growing to affect people every part of the country. Our mission at Inter-Faith Food Shuttle has always been to alleviate hunger in our community. Promoting community awareness that it is simply unacceptable for people to go hungry in our country is one way to fight hunger. We are grateful those in the media who share our passion for working together to end hunger, and report on issues surrounding that idea. Recently a few stories have hit the news stream informing the public about these rising hunger statistics and our Backpack Buddies program.
Clayton Henkel interviewed Jill and Jason on the NC Policy Watch show to discuss the recent increase in food insecurity in the Greater Triangle. You can listen to the interview on their blog by downloading the MP3 file here.
The Herald Sun published an articleabout the Digitalsmiths partnering with Inter-Faith Food Shuttle. We are excited about the company's plan to support BackPack Buddies.
You can help us get out the word about the problem of hunger. Send out this link to your families and friends or encourage them to go to www.foodshuttle.org to learn more. We need more people becoming informed and passionate about hunger if we want to solve the problem.
Get to know the Food Shuttle Staff: Nickie Charles!
Name and title: Nickie Charles, Hands on Health Coordinator What does at typical day at IFFS look like for you? My typical day at IFFS starts with a morning briefing with my supervisor: Tonya Post, we discuss successes and usually the weeks events. Then it is out to the communities, usually I stop by the seniors of the area, spend some time with them during walks, helping them see their progress in their lives, also giving them an outlet to be a part of something more than they can see for themselves...I enjoy seeing them become active within their own lives. Then I usually stop and talk to the kids in the area, finding out about their week. From there its back to IFFS to get ready to go back out and start the FITCamp programs where I do an intensive workout incorporating Tai Chi and Qigong with heavy callisthenic work.
How long have you been at the Shuttle? 8 months and a few days
What’s your favorite part about working at IFFS? The community of my colleagues, there is always a laugh within the day...also before I had a job now I'm doing what I'm passionate about: community, families, children and making sure they are making healthy living an active part of their lives.
What did you do before IFFS? Chief of Staff, Manhattan School of Music
P/T: Conducting Food Demo's throughout the 5-boroughs of NYC
What do you like to do when you’re not fighting hunger? I'm an avid reader, I love to read about holistic (natural) approaches to nutritional health and exercise.
Gossiping on the phone with my girlfriends.
Favorite Movie? The entire Jason Bourne trilogies
Your last meal would be? Shrimp & Grits
Happy Thanksgiving!
Crew Call
We are so THANKFUL for you – our wonderful volunteers – so we’re giving you the week off!! There will be no Crew Call the week of Thanksgiving. Farm staff and volunteers will take some well-earned time off with their families who have been very patient this year. We hope that each of you has a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.
The next Crew-call will be Dec 5th, location to be announced.
Community Gardens
While there is no crew call, Amanda and Volunteers will be in the Mayview Garden on Wed, Nov 25th for any pre-Turkey day harvesting. Come out and join her if you’re in town 3:45-5:30. Please email Amanda (NutritionCoord@foodshuttle.org) if you’re thinking about stopping by.
New!! Farm & Garden Compost Crew
Farm & Garden volunteer extraordinaire Ron Paul Hunter will be heading up our latest project starting in December - the Food Shuttle Farm & Garden Compost Crew. Expanding on our current composting program that utilizes food waste from the IFFS Culinary Job Training Program, we will be processing spoiled produce from Food Shuttles loading dock as well as recruiting local coffee shops and restaurants to send us their food waste. *Start thinking now about which restaurant you want to talk to about donating their food scraps. We will also build a vermi-composting(worms) facility this winter in an existing barn at the IFFS Farm. Compost generated from the IFFS composting program will be used to improve soil structure at the Farm and our community gardens. The vermi-composting facility will be an exciting educational addition for kids and adults alike when visiting the Farm.
We need volunteers to work at Food Shuttle and the Farm to remove plastic and ties from compostable produce, and help Ron transport and incoporate that material into our compost wind-rows at the Farm. In the near future we hope to establish compost routes to pick up materials from our participating business. Join us in taking this next important step in making the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle Farm and Community Gardens truly sustainable. If you’re interested in helping out, please contact Ron at rphunter@civilizationcontinuity.org Thanks again for all of your wonderful work this season. We’ve done so much!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Volunteer Photographers
Pictures can depict the Food Shuttle's mission and the magnitude of work that our volunteers do every week. Thanks to Twitter and the N&O's Retail and Coupon Queen, Sue Stock, we've been linked up with a couple of spectacular photographers. Photographers Mark Petko and Andy Beal responded to a ReTweet from @FoodShuttle that Sue Stock sent out. Mark, Andy, and other volunteer photographers are now a part of a monthly photo opp email to shoot pictures at Inter-Faith Food Shuttle events and programs at their own convenience.
Andy recently shot some wonderful pictures from our annual Turkey Takeout last Friday
Mark spent a morning at the farm picking lettuce and taking some amazing pictures
Mark also came out to the Carolina Rollergirls Charity Bout this past Saturday to catch the action at Dorton Arena
We are extremely thankful for these photographers who have been volunteering time to capture the Food Shuttle through a lens. Our Flickr site has been updated with a handful of Mark and Andy's pictures. Email Jason (jason@foodshuttle.org) or CeCe (cece@foodshuttle.org) to become a Food Shuttle volunteer photographer!
What a weekend!
So let's recap. Friday morning, we had our annual Turkey Takeout. We distributed 500 Thanksgiving meals to our partner agencies. Here's WRAL's story on the big day here. Our friend Andy Beal (@andybeal) took some great pictures that we've posted to our Flickr site. And here's our Behind-The-Scenes look at how it went down.
Friday night was the benefit concert/dance party put on by NC State Students at the Sky lounge on Hillsborough Street. That was a lot of fun. We are still figuring up how much food and cash we collected. Who knew our very own Cece White could do such a mean Electric Slide? Even the Food Dude was there.
Saturday night was the Carolina Roller Girls Charity Bout. We'll have pictures and a handle on how much food was collected later this week.
This was a great way to kickoff the holiday season. We can't fight hunger across seven counties without support from the community. Great businesses like US Foods, engaged college students, the Carolina Rollergirls, our partner agencies and volunteers--THANKS!