Letter on the Need and Our Progress

Thanks to generous support from caring individuals and corporate sponsors, Share Our Strength is stepping up its efforts to help every child at risk of hunger find the food she or he needs.

Let me tell you about a few of the things you helped us achieve over the past year:

Strengthened the Nation’s Anti-Hunger Safety Net: Our unique approach to grantmaking helped to identify the after-school and summer feeding programs, schools, community centers and food programs that reach the most vulnerable children. Through our national plan, Share Our Strength’s Operation No Kid Hungry™, we provided strategic grants totaling $3.5 million to those partners and our state childhood hunger partners to help serve more than 6 million children at risk of hunger.

Forged powerful new partnerships to make “No Kid Hungry” a reality: We celebrated another great milestone for Operation No Kid Hungry, when Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley publicly announced his partnership with Share Our Strength and his goal to make Maryland the first state in the country to end childhood hunger. And like Share Our Strength, the Obama Administration has pledged to end childhood hunger in the United States by 2015.

Expanded Cooking and Nutrition Classes to Families at Risk of Hunger: Share Our Strength’s Operation Frontline® program is now offering nutrition classes in 19 regions. Using chefs and nutritionists as volunteer teachers, Operation Frontline shows families with limited resources how to stretch their budgets and make healthy meals at home. We send the adults and teens home with a bag of groceries so they can practice making the recipes they learned in class.

I’m extremely proud of what we’re accomplishing together. But our work is not about accolades or statistics. It’s about real children who will go to bed hungry, right here in our country, without our ongoing help.

This story reminds us that our work together is at once necessary and urgent. It’s from the Idaho Foodbank where every Friday, they distribute backpacks filled with food to needy schoolchildren.

One little boy was high on the teacher’s list for food assistance. When she gave him the backpack, he said, “I get to have all this food? It’s for me?” The teacher nodded and told him to bring the backpack back on Monday and she would fill it up again next weekend. The boy said, “I get to eat every weekend? My mom’s gonna cry.” The following Monday the boy was the first one in school, backpack in hand. He asked his teacher how many days it would be before he could have more.

We know there is no quick fix. Our success will require steady and determined work, year after year. That’s why I hope you’ll stay with us this year and continue your support. That support—as a volunteer, a sponsor, a program partner, a guest at one of our events, a purchaser of an item that benefits Share Our Strength, or as a much-valued donor—will allow us to make progress in three critical areas:

1. Increase access to programs that provide food to children and families

We understand that we can’t solve the problems on our own. That’s why we provide grants to hundreds of organizations around the country that are providing food to needy families. Since we began in 1984, Share Our Strength has raised over $245 million and provided support to more than 1,000 nonprofits working to end hunger.

This year, our grant requests from anti-hunger organizations have more than doubled compared to last year. It’s a sign of the tremendous and growing need that exists in our country. We’re determined to meet this demand by making 2009 the largest grant-giving year in our history, with your continued support.

2. Bring Operation No Kid Hungry to new states

As I mentioned earlier, Share Our Strength is pioneering a new approach to reducing hunger at the state level – working in partnership with leading nonprofits that have effective influence across the state, or with state governments themselves. We currently have partnerships established in Florida, Maryland, Washington, and Washington, D.C.

We’re getting phenomenal results. In Washington State, we worked to expand eligibility for food stamps, making it possible for another 23,000 needy households to participate.

Now, with a President who has declared his commitment to ending childhood hunger, we are optimistic that we can expand this effort dramatically in the next years. We’re in conversations with Secretary of Agriculture Vilisak about integrating these state partnerships into the Obama Administration’s own plans.

3. Improve Families’ Knowledge About Food and Food Assistance

The sad truth is that many children go hungry even while programs exist that could provide them with food. Nationally, only 60% of those eligible for food stamps receive benefits. And in many states, children do not have access to school breakfasts that have been proven to boost their achievement.

Share Our Strength is working to make programs like food stamps and school breakfasts more accessible to everyone who is eligible. In Washington, D.C., we provided a grant to the Friendship Public Charter School to cover the costs of administering a federally funded school breakfast program. Without this grant, the school would not have been able to give all students free breakfast in the classroom. Now, enrollment is up, behavior has improved and children can focus on learning.

We also know that meals prepared at home are critically important. Our Operation Frontline program is teaching hard-hit families how to stretch their food budget and prepare healthy meals with cooking classes for adults, teens and children. We currently have programs in 19 areas across the country with plans to expand to 25 in the next two years.

Yes, we have a lot of work to do in the weeks and months ahead.

From the little boy in Idaho to the toddler in a Boca Raton preschool program that provides her with a snack and a supper, children need our help today. With your continued support, we will continue to provide it in ways we know work. You can find more ways to help here.

Thank you, as always, for your faith in our work and your belief that together we can end childhood hunger in America.