It has just started to feel like summer here in King County, and yet the school season is just around the corner! While many students are getting all the required items they need for school as well as the “cool” new school clothes, others have a bigger issue to worry about…where they are going to sleep at night.
SchoolHouse Washington (a website that provides information and support for homeless students) recently came out with some findings breaking down homelessness for children and teens in…
Neighborhood House is a United Way of King County grantee for our summer meals grants, and last week I visited their Rainier Vista meal site, one of the two sites they manage in King County. They serve lunch Monday-Friday from 12:00p.m.-1:00p.m., and they will continue to do so until August, 24th. Their sponsor is the City of Seattle and they receive meals from the Seattle School District.
They have two volunteers who help to serve the 30-45 children that come in to eat…
On July 14, 2012, the volunteers headed to Renton’s Sunset Terrace Community Building—a partner site for United Way of King County‘s summer meal program. There, they learned about the inner workings of the Summer Food Service Program, a federal program that helps end hunger by feeding kids all summer long, when free or reduced-price meals at school are unavailable.
Boeing volunteers then grabbed bags full of promotional door hangers and hit the streets to get the word out about easy access to summer meal program sites.…
The United Way of King County’s next Community Resource Exchange (CRE) is scheduled for October 18 at the Seattle Center. We need volunteers to spearhead supply drives to collect more than 2,000 items to be provided to participants that attend the CRE. Items that are needed include NEW socks and hygiene items (razors, soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, lotion, etc.) as well as books (can be second-hand). Interested in leading a supply drive in your neighborhood, club, church, organization, and/or community? Register on our…
“Over 96,000 King County children utilize free or reduced lunch in school, an 8.5% increase since 2006. However in 2011 only 9.6% of these children who are eligible for free lunch accessed free summer meals.”
This was part of the training for the outreach events that the United Way of King County Summer Meals volunteers took part in. Volunteers attended a short training on how the Summer Food Service Program works, why we needed to do outreach, and what they were going to be doing…
Today, Nora Peters and I went to Little Eagles to talk to the Orcas about Hunger Action Week. When I was first invited, I spent a great deal of time thinking how I could talk about the issue of hunger to children who range in ages from 3.5-4 years of age. I didn’t want to throw hunger facts at them, but I wanted them to understand the importance of our food choices. I decided to take a page out of Ellen Gustafson’s book and just…
With food bank use up 30%, the donation of nonperishable food items couldn’t have come at a better time! Whitepage.com employees decided that their participation in Hunger Action Week was going to be in the form of a food drive, and they collected quite the bounty in a very short time (just 2 weeks). It was such a delight to help unload the fully packed Subaru on Sunday, March 18th at the Microsoft Store in University Village. They had collected an assortment of items that…
The Seattle-King County Asset Building Collaborative will be having their annual Financial Fitness day on March 31st. They have joined with over 40 community partners to be able to bring community members FREE financial services. These services include everything from one-on-one help filling out a tax return, printing and analyzing free credit reports, opening bank accounts, creating a household budget, working with a financial planner, applying for public benefits (food, utilities, child care, health insurance, social security), learning how to start a business, shredding…
United Way of King County’s Points of Light HandsOn Corps members Jenny, Morgan and Ariana have been hard at work since September! Jenny has been working on the free tax campaign helping low-income King County residents access the tax credits they are eligible for (TAX). Morgan helped organize the Community Resource Exchange, which connects individuals and families experiencing homelessness with the services they need all in one day, in one place (CRE). Ariana is working with the Volunteer Reader Program, which places Volunteer…
United Way of King County is shining a bright light on hunger and we’re asking everyone including teenagers and children to think about their relationship to food. Who has food, who doesn’t, where does your food come from?
As parents or educators you might be wondering how you can get your children/students involved in Hunger Action Week. Whole families can participate in the Hunger Challenge (eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner, spending only $7 a day—the same amount allotted to a single person on food stamps),…
