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Food program helps feed kids during summer in Norwood, Norfolk, Raymondville areas

Posted 9/1/16

To the Editor: In early June, a small group of concerned community members came together to discuss a dilemma that faces children in the Norwood-Norfolk School District each summer. Children who …

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Food program helps feed kids during summer in Norwood, Norfolk, Raymondville areas

Posted

To the Editor:

In early June, a small group of concerned community members came together to discuss a dilemma that faces children in the Norwood-Norfolk School District each summer. Children who receive free breakfast and lunch throughout the school year are suddenly without these benefits when the school year ends.

This small group of people wanted to see what they could do to remedy this situation. This group, who become known as The Community Summer Lunch Program for Kids, solicited both monetary and non-perishable food items from local churches, agencies and businesses.

Because of the generosity of these groups we were able to offer two different days during the summer when we would distribute large boxes of breakfast and lunch food items. During the July distribution we provided food for 24 families, which included 51 children and in August we provided food for 36 families, which included 80 children, all from NNCS.

At this time, we would like to acknowledge the following businesses/civic groups for giving so generously towards this program:

Stewarts’ Shops, St. Philip’s Episcopal Guild, Norwood-Norfolk-Raymondville Outreach, Norfolk American Legion, Norwood Free Methodist Church, Raymondville Methodist Church, Norwood-Norfolk Teachers’ Association, St. Andrew’s Knights of Columbus, Walmart of Massena, St. Andrew’s Altar Rosary Society, The Norfolk Wesleyan Church, Neighbors Helping Neighbors and the parishioners of the Catholic Churches of Norwood, Norfolk and Raymondville. We also received 2 very generous monetary donations from individuals.

A special thank you to the Friends of the Norwood Public Library and the Norfolk Public Library for donating new books, crayons, coloring pages, and art activities to give to the children involved in this program.

We would also like to express a heartfelt thanks to Mary Ellen Todd, (Snack Pack coordinator for NNCS for her knowledge and guidance in this pursuit.

Though we realize that this was not a solution to this problem, we were still very pleased to be able to put together some kind of program to address this concern on such short notice.

As a group, we will continue to meet to look for ideas to address this situation, this fall and into the coming school year.

Thanks again to the businesses, civic organizations and individuals who made this project possible!

Community Summer Lunch Program for Kids in the Norwood, Norfolk, Raymondville Area