Thanksgiving and Giving To Help Others

Thanksgiving Food Drive Feeds Low-Income Residents
VOA - Selah Hennessy | Denver
November 18, 2011



The Thanksgiving holiday, celebrated in the U.S. on the last Thursday of November is a big date, but for those with a low income, getting a traditional dinner on the table can be a struggle. In Denver, Colorado, the Volunteers of America charity is preparing a food drive to make sure those families get the food they need.

Volunteers of America helper Rodney Cunningham unloads boxes of Thanksgiving food for low-income families. He’ll be getting a box himself to feed his four children and grandchildren.

“This Thanksgiving box is very important because I don’t receive food stamps or anything," he explains, "so this is the only way that I would be able to get a Turkey and the other things going with it.” 

Cunningham and other volunteers are sorting the food into 1,500 baskets ready to deliver on Thanksgiving Day. The baskets will be filled with all sorts of tasty treats that make up a traditional Thanksgiving meal. Demand has been greater than ever this year, Cunningham says.

“One of the reasons why it’s really important is because the economy is pretty bad and a lot of people have a need for extra food. They don’t have any food at all.”

Jim White, director of community affairs at the charity, says local residents donate the food.

“These individuals donated over 148 tons of food but it takes a huge amount of food as you can imagine to do 1,500 food baskets complete with stuffing and cranberries and pumpkin and fresh produce and then they are all topped off with a 15-pound (6.8-kilogram) frozen turkey,” he explains.

Thanksgiving is not just about eating well, he adds.

“Whatever your situation is we all have a lot to be thankful for," White says. "And Thanksgiving should be viewed as a verb not a noun and what better way to give thanks than to help somebody out that you know is struggling right now.”

Making sure people get a good Thanksgiving dinner is, for Cunningham, the best part of his work.

“They are very happy. They are blessed and it makes me feel to good to see the smiles on their faces, you know, it’s like you can see their stomach get big like they are full,”  White says.

And that is what drives him to keep volunteering.

Americans volunteering jumped by 1.6 million last year...

Despite Hard Times, Volunteering Spikes in US
Volunteer rate jumps among all race and ethnic groups
Faiza Elmasry | Washington, D.C.
August 29, 2011
VOA

The number of Americans volunteering in their communities jumped by 1.6 million last year, the largest increase in six years, according to a recent government report.

According to “Volunteering in America,” 63.4 million Americans gave 8.1 billion hours through formal organizations in 2010. The volunteer rate went up among all race and ethnic groups.

“We have found out that volunteering is core to who we are as Americans,” says Heather Peeler, spokeswoman for the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS), the federal agency which conducted the study. “What we've found is that volunteers are working with youth through mentoring and tutoring. More than a quarter of volunteers are helping non-profit organizations raise needed funds. And one out of five volunteers are giving what we call ‘sweat hours,’ the general labor that’s needed to help non-profit organizations run.”

More essential than ever

The United States has a long tradition of volunteering, as opposed to many European countries where government is pervasive and provides most of basic services, like free daycare for children and comprehensive medical care. In addition, recent cuts in the budgets of many U.S. states have made volunteering even more essential.

According to Peeler, American volunteers provided services valued at nearly $173 billion last year. Utah ranked number one among the U.S. states. Among cities, Minneapolis-St. Paul, in Minnesota, led the way.

“The people in our communities in the greater twin cities say we’re not just going to complain about a problem, we’re going to do something to help solve it,” says Kathy Saltzman, executive director of the Minnesota Education Corps.

More than 900 of the organization's members donate a year, without pay, to help improve children's literacy.

“If children cannot read by 3rd grade, they have such an overwhelming obstacle to overcome in order to be successful because first you learn to read," says Saltzman. "After 3rd grade, you read to learn.”

Finding the time

Minnesota Education Corps also recruits volunteers like Mike Ginal, 51, who dedicates an hour a day, five days a week, to tutoring children.

“We get to the school and the kids come into a classroom where it is one-on-one interaction," says Ginal. "There is a set story for the child to read. We’re doing any corrections and basically tracking the student’s progress in comprehending the stories. We ask specific questions regarding the story. Also, we are checking them for how many words per minute they have benchmarking throughout the school year.”

Ginal and his wife have time to volunteer because their kids are grown.

“We’re not chasing our kids in their activities now and we definitely have more time to devote to the community," he says. "We’re involved in feeding the seniors here in town. This weekend we’re picking apples for the food banks from a donating apple orchard.”

Gen X gets involved

While Ginal belongs to the older generation of Americans known for their volunteering, the Volunteering America report finds people born between 1965 and 1981, known as Generation X, volunteered more time in 2010 than ever before, contributing 2.3 billion hours.

And young adults, partly due to social networking, are becoming more active as well.

Quinn Gardner, 25, is a volunteer coordinator at AmeriCorps, the national service organization. Her focus is disaster relief. Her volunteers are currently helping residents of Joplin, Missouri recover from a devastating tornado earlier this year.

“Some of my teams have been down here since day one," she says. "So in events of disaster, we specialize in volunteer management, donation management as well as direct services, helping owners gain access to their home, removing trees, roofs, creating space environments.”

According to Gardner, young people volunteer for many reasons.

“I think a lot of these people come out for the experience, to help someone else, give back and find themselves in the process."

CNCS spokeswoman Peeler hopes the study provides officials and non-profit groups with the information they need to mobilize more Americans to help meet pressing needs.

Volunteer Farming - Help the Hungry

Volunteer Farm Feeds the Hungry

Virginia farm supplies tons of fresh produce to area food banks

Susan Logue | Woodstock, Virginia -  September 09, 2010 - VOA

Photo: VOA - A. Greenbaum

Children with a church group help harvest potatoes that will be sent to area food banks to help feed the hungry.

Hunger in the United States is nothing compared to hunger in some parts of the world.  Nevertheless, 10 million American households report that they do not always know where they will find their next meal according to "Hunger in America 2010."

The report by Feeding America, the largest domestic hunger-relief charity in the U.S., also says that each week, more than 5.5 million Americans turn to emergency food sources such as food pantries.  Most of what they find in these charitable dispensaries is bottled, canned or dry goods.
But at a farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, fresh food is being harvested to feed the hungry.

Volunteer farm

It looks like a lot of other produce farms, with rows of pepper, tomato and cucumber plants.
But nothing harvested here goes to market. Retired government worker Bob Blair owns the 26 hectares of land, but leases it to the Volunteer Farm of Shenandoah for $1 a year. "I woke up one morning and there was the idea firmly implanted in my head with all of the details, including the name, Volunteer Farm," he says.

VOA - S. Logue Koster

Retired government worker Bob Blair leases his land to the Volunteer Farm for $1 a year.

A manager and a volunteer coordinator are the farm's only paid staff. As its name suggests, the farm relies on volunteers to weed, plant and harvest. Blair says in the seven years the farm has operated, it has had over 10,000 volunteers. They have come from nearly every U.S. state and 26 foreign countries.
One a recent day, a group from Tinkling Springs Presbyterian Church drove more than 100 kilometers to collect potatoes from a field. The majority of the volunteers, more than 50, were children.

VOA - S. Logue Koster

Volunteering at the farm gives children a tangible way of knowing they've made a difference, says church leader Harriet Thompson.

Lesson learned

Harriet Thompson, one of the church leaders, says that after a few hours working in the sun, "the children go to bed extra tired, but they know in a very physical and tangible way that they have made a difference."  She says the church has been volunteering at the farm for a few years. "There are many individuals within our community that would not have enough to sustain them or their family throughout the week if it wasn't for this farm."
Produce from the Volunteer Farm is distributed through large food banks - warehouses where representatives of smaller, community agencies, like soup kitchens and pantries, get food for their clients.
"We received last year, approximately 71,000 pounds of fresh produce from the Volunteer Farm," says Teresa Yates, Operations Director of the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank Network.

VOA - A. Greenbaum

These 26 hectares of land are leased to the Volunteer Farm of Shenandoah to help provide fresh fruits and vegetables for the hungry.

She says the fruits and vegetables are important for proper nutrition. "We have so many issues with obesity now. Fresh produce is the way to go, especially for our children. It's healthier, so much better for their bodies and we are able to provide so much with the Volunteer Farm."

Free and fresh

Yates says the food bank has seen an increase in demand for assistance over the past four years, from 65,000 clients a month seeking food for their families to nearly 100,000.

Even in Middleburg, Virginia, an affluent community of about 600 people surrounded by manicured estates and prosperous farms, some people rely on the Seven Loaves food pantry to help feed their families.

"We have a number of elderly who may have worked on those farms or in labor-type jobs who are retired and trying to get by on a relatively low social security income," says George Lengauer, president of the ecumenical faith-based, volunteer organization.

The food Seven Loaves distributes comes from many sources, but most is in cans or boxes. Lengauer says the Volunteer Farm's contributions are special.

"We do have supermarkets in the area who contribute to us and some of them give us the gleanings off their produce aisle, which is good and nice. But any time you can get farm fresh produce, it is a real treat."

So far this year, the Volunteer Farm has harvested 5,500 kilograms of vegetables and the food will keep coming until the middle of October.

Volunteer Farm Feeds the Hungry - article and video about volunteer farming came from VOA