Fifty-eight % of children in Seymour’s school district receive free and reduced-price meals at school, but for many students, meals aren’t a guarantee when they go home. For families who are worried about making ends meet, Seymour YMCA provides out-of-school meals for children to reassure families that their kids are being nourished.
When Judy Willis retired, she knew she wanted to get out there and do something. “I look around and I just think, golly, there’s just so much people could do if they would just do it,” she said. So, when Judy found out she could use her gardening hobby to help feed her community, that’s exactly what she did.
Did you know people living in rural areas are more likely to experience hunger than in urban areas? Individuals and families in rural communities grapple with issues that decrease their access to nutritious foods, such as few to no nearby grocery stores, longer commutes to work and lack of reliable transportation. On top of that, neighbors across southwest Missouri are currently dealing with high childcare, housing and food costs. Phyllis Sprenkle, board member of the Sheldon Revitalization Association and member of the community betterment group, said that the town of Sheldon, Missouri checks all of those boxes.
Did you know more families turn to Ozarks Food Harvest’s hunger-relief network when kids go on summer break? Thousands of children across the Ozarks rely on nutritious school meals during the school year, but when school is out, they worry about where their next meal will come from.
“When you pour into your community, you’re pouring into the people you love,” Andrea Mann shared. She’s a solution support analyst at Netsmart, a healthcare software company with the mantra: vision-driven, cause-connected and passionate about opportunity and obligation. Netsmart is living up to that mantra by encouraging employees to give back – and pour into the communities they love.
According to volunteer Lynn Cline, memorizing facts and absorbing information like we do as children and students becomes more difficult as people age, but the benefit of experience is that we gain the wisdom to see how it all connects – how our choices and actions make a difference in the world.
“Anyone who wants or needs a meal, we don’t turn anybody down,” said Pat Scheets, a core staff person at the Summersville Senior Center. That’s the attitude of someone who knows the power of a homecooked meal and why the Summersville Senior Center means a lot to their community.
SPRINGFIELD, Mo.— Walmart and Sam’s Club will help Ozarks Food Harvest address hunger in the Ozarks this spring through the 11th annual Fight Hunger. Spark Change. campaign.
Have you been wondering how to fit exercise, self-care and making a difference into your schedule? With volunteering you don’t have to choose; it lets you do all three!
Ozarks Food Harvest will invest more than $258,000 this year to provide nutritious food to rural families facing hunger thanks to two recent grants from Feeding America and Tyson Foods.