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SALT LAKE CITY — Over 350,000 people are facing hunger throughout Utah — 113,700 of them are children, according to data from Feeding America.
To help combat child food insecurity, the Granite School District teamed up with Lehi-based Lendio to donate a total of 2,600 boxes of cereal between Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson and James E. Moss elementary schools.
Lendio is a small business financial solutions marketplace, according to Brett Child, the company's executive vice president. Child spearheaded the effort to bring cereal to the schools by asking his employees to donate cereal boxes. Initially, Lendio was aiming to donate 1,000 boxes but quickly realized they'd be able to donate more.
"I have a daughter who teaches and a wife that volunteers in the Granite School District. With an increase in the refugee community (in the district), we noticed that the needs are great and realized we can contribute in a small way over the long holiday break," Child said. "The goal is to give two boxes to each and every kid at each and every one of these elementary schools so that they've got two boxes to take home to help augment and offset what they don't have access to over the holiday break."
Ben Horsley, director of communications and community outreach at Granite School District, said that two-thirds of students within the district suffer from food insecurity in some way.
To further combat this, the Granite Education Foundation provides food pantries and food services, including packs of food for students to take home during the holiday break when they don't have access to meals at school.
"The foundation is our nonprofit partner that helps with those services. Those (food pantries) are spread throughout Granite School District in some of our most needy areas," Horsley said.
State funding for food and nutrition programs for children rose by 59% from 2008 to 2020 and by 14% from 2018 to 2020, according to a Voices for Utah Children report released on Thursday. Investing in food and nutrition programs for children is important in attaining educational success, Horsley said.
"At the beginning of the day, if a child is hungry they're not going to learn," he said. "Providing food in some of these types of situations helps us improve the product of our educational outcomes."
It's also the right thing to do, he added.
"Kids don't get to make those types of decisions, with respect to their finances, and they don't get to choose their financial circumstances," Horsely said. "It seems appropriate that we would band together as a community and help each other out."
