Our club is partnering with KACS Food Cupboard to create awareness in our community on the issue of hunger and to take action to help stock the Food Cupboard in its leanest months, those of the summer, culminating with Hunger Awareness Month in September. Food pantries, soup kitchens, and other charitable food assistance organizations report seeing an increased need for food assistance for children during summer months. Stacie Kucera, executive director at KACS, will come to our club to give a presentation in September and receive a cheque for any money we have raised along the way.

KACS Target population: Families living at or below 150% of the federal poverty level and living within the three school districts of Kennett Consolidated, Avon Grove, and Unionville/Chadds Ford.

• KACS Food Cupboard assists over 1,200 individuals representing 380 families each month with food assistance.  Each family receives about a week’s worth of food once per month. 
• KACS Food Cupboard is seeing a 14% increase in utilization of the Food Cupboard over this time last year.
• KACS Food Cupboard distributes an average of over 17,500 pounds of food each month to families in need in our area.
• KACS Food Cupboard is almost entirely manned by volunteers who log in about 500 hours each month to sort, stock, pick up, deliver, register, and distribute food each and every week.

Our specific focus, as a club, is awareness about childhood hunger : The problem of childhood hunger is not simply a moral issue. Child hunger hampers a young person's ability to learn and they become more likely to suffer from poverty as an adult. Scientific evidence suggests that hungry children are less likely to become productive citizens. 

Facts of Child Hunger in America

•Nearly 14 million children are estimated to be served by Feeding America, over 3 million of which are ages 5 and under. 
•According to the USDA, over 16 million children lived in food insecure (low food security and very low food security) households in 2010. 
•Proper nutrition is vital to the growth and development of children. 62 percent of client households with children under the age of 18 reported participating in the National School Lunch Program, but only 14 percent reported having a child participate in a summer feeding program that provides free food when school is out.¹
•54 percent of client households with children under the age of 3 participated in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC).¹
•32 percent of pantries, 42 percent of kitchens, and 18 percent of shelters in the Feeding America network reported "many more children in the summer" being served by their programs.¹
•In 2010, 16.4 million or approximately 22 percent of children in the U.S. lived in poverty. 
•Research indicates that hungry children do more poorly in school and have lower academic achievement because they are not well prepared for school and cannot concentrate. 
•Insufficient nutrition puts children at risk for illness and weakens their immune system. The immature immune systems of young children, ages 0 – 5, make them especially vulnerable to nutritional deprivation and as a result, the ability to learn, grow, and fight infections is adversely affected.
 
 

1. Rhoda Cohen, J. Mabli, F., Potter, Z., Zhao. Mathematica Policy Research. Feeding America. Hunger in America 2010. February 2010.