Over the past year, the Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-A-School campaign sent $1,680,081 to 150 schools across B.C. to feed and clothe children arriving at school hungry or in need of adequate clothing.
Since AAS began in 2011, it has provided millions of free meals for children who would not otherwise have been fed.
Since AAS began in 2011, $15.1 million in aid has been sent to hundreds of B.C. schools. It has provided millions of free meals for children who would not otherwise have been fed and has allowed teachers ready access to funds to help a child in immediate need of clothing or other help as a result of privation.
With the new school year about to begin, the need could be even greater.
Reports from teachers across the province last spring indicated a growing number of children arriving at school hungry, improperly dressed, or with other unmet emergency needs as families relying on social assistance or minimum wage jobs struggled to feed themselves and pay rent.
Sam le Riche, principal of Old Yale Road elementary in Surrey — one of the schools being helped by AAS — sees daily evidence of this.
In an interview earlier this year she said her school was struggling with the numbers of poor families in the Whalley area and was concerned that the school’s ability to help them was being overwhelmed.
Hunger appears to have been a constant visitor to her school.
The school is closed for summer, but during the school year “students, parents, even the homeless and unhoused — people who don’t belong to the school — come in asking for food,” said le Riche.
What does she do?
“I’ll find them food.”
Many families identified as requiring help by the school are single parent or immigrant families or refugees who have moved to Whalley because rents are lower in the numerous apartments and high rises surrounding the school.
Dozens of languages are spoken by children attending Old Yale Road.
“It’s a beautiful, multicultural diverse population and we have to use Google translate daily,” said le Riche, “although we have many students who speak dialects that aren’t translatable by Google.”
However, feeding children when they come to school hungry is only part of what’s needed.
Some 40 vulnerable children need feeding on weekends and during school holidays as well, because their parents are unable to provide for them.
Finding sufficient food has become a year-round endeavour for le Riche.
The Christmas, Easter and summer holidays are the direst times of the year for hungry children as they are missing the school meals provided five days a week by the province’s Feeding Futures program.
Teachers across the province have said the prospect of holidays causes acute anxiety for such children as they worry about going hungry when schools are closed.
The Vancouver Sun Children’s Fund, which administers AAS, provided $28,000 this year so le Riche could feed families on weekends during the school year.
In partnership with Relate Church — a Christian denomination on 152nd Street — that $28,000 was turned over to the church to produce food parcels which were then delivered to the school for distribution by staff every Friday.
However, during the summer when school is closed, the church raises its own funds and provides food parcels twice a month for those families.
After Sunday service on July 27 there were more than 100 parishioners busy in the church sorting out food for families to be delivered by volunteers to homes in the area.
Pastor Jacquie McGee, who runs the church’s community reach program, said the congregation has raised $20,000 this summer to provide food parcels to families of four inner city schools including Old Yale Road.
“We couldn’t do this all year long without The Vancouver Sun.
”I’ve had teachers cry and say ‘thank you.’ I can sleep better knowing our church is taking care of these families,’” said McGee.
”When we go to the homes the kids are jumping up and down. They are so excited that some groceries are coming into their house,” she said.
Old Yale Road elementary also receives part of the $100,000 given to Surrey’s Attendance Matters program by AAS.
Attendance Matters is designed to combat poor attendance by impoverished children who often skip school. They are encouraged to come in early to be fed before classes start. The successful program runs in more than 30 inner city schools and has been funded by AAS since 2011.
Surrey, the largest school district in the province, received a total of $394,580 from AAS this year.
Vancouver received $318,206.
A total of 156 grants were made to 31 school districts with the majority going for food, clothing and emergency needs.
“Once again our generous readers have responded to the needs of these unfortunate children and the teachers who are trying to help them,” said Harold Munro, chair of the Children’s Fund board and editor-in-chief of The Sun.
”And I can’t thank you enough for enabling us to give teachers the means to do something for children whose parents, through no fault of their own, are unable to give them fully what they need.
”We all know what food and rent inflation are doing to families with limited income.”
No administration fees are deducted from donations to the Adopt-A-School program. One hundred per cent of all money donated is directed to help children.
How to donate
1. ONLINE: Donate online with a credit card at www.vansunkidsfund.ca
2. PHONE: To pay by credit card, call 604-813-8673.
By Gerry Bellett (gbellett@gmail.com)
