A passion for helping others drove Amanda Kirkpatrick, a senior at Missouri State University, to major in elementary education.
However, it wasn’t until she volunteered at Ozarks Food Harvest that she realized the scope of what a teacher can do to help make a difference in the lives of students who are hungry.
Ozarks Food Harvest received a large truckload of nonperishable food this fall, thanks to the ninth annual McDonald’s Cans for Coffee food drive.
More than sixty area McDonald’s restaurants collected 27,254 pounds of food. The donation makes Cans for Coffee one of Ozarks Food Harvest’s largest food drives.
As part of an annual Thanksgiving tradition, local racers come together to collect food for Ozarks Food Harvest and participate in Turkey Trot, the largest Thanksgiving Day 5K in Missouri.
Each fall, my team organizes Hunger Action Month, a 30-day campaign to encourage community members to take action against hunger.
Although the campaign takes a lot of planning and preparation, it makes it all worth it when I see how the community comes together to help its neighbors.
Hungerthon, our largest fundraiser of the year, raised $140,447. It was great to visit with so many long-time supporters of the event who continue to be motivated by our mission to help kids come back to school on Mondays with full stomachs.
Ozarks Food Harvest does more than supply food – it provides a network of hope to struggling children, families and seniors right here in our community.
Because we’re committed to providing a hand up, not simply a hand out, our network of 200 hunger-relief charities provide services like nutrition education, skills classes and even promoting job fairs and helping people sign up for SNAP, all in addition to food distribution.
Natalie and Ricky work hard to provide for themselves and their nine-month-old daughter. But sometimes there isn’t enough money to ensure there’s something to eat.
“I work two jobs, she’s a stay at home mom,” said Ricky. “With all the other expenses we have … a little help is needed. By the time I pay the rent and utilities and car insurance, we come up short on food often.”
Natalie and Ricky are able to get the food assistance they need at Crosslines, an Ozarks Food Harvest member pantry in Springfield.
Ozarks Food Harvest and iHeartMedia’s 18th annual radio-thon, Hungerthon, collected a record-breaking $140,447 for the Weekend Backpack Program. The initiative provides 1,668 food insecure children with nutritious food to take home over the weekends, when school meals aren’t available and many kids go hungry.
Artists and community members came together this September for the most successful Empty Bowls yet. The third annual fundraiser held at Panera Bread raised $7,440, selling all 220 handcrafted bowls donated by nearly 60 local artists.
Greetings from the O’Reilly Center for Hunger Relief!
You may remember I wrote in last summer’s Harvest Time about the need for a strong Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act to be passed by Congress.
Unfortunately, that legislation has yet to be passed more than a year later, and a new provision added by the House would hurt hungry kids.
Over 2,000 volunteers from businesses across the Ozarks came together to help more than 100 nonprofit agencies during this year’s United Way Day of Caring.