By Jennifer Crain
An evening of packing bags with food for hungry teens is “fun, organized chaos,” says Sean Boyd, pastor of Fountain Church in Tumwater.
Boyd would know. Since the program started in 2006, he and 15-20 other church members have gathered regularly to stuff bags with shelf-stable foods to help get homeless teens through the weekend.
Boyd says his church got involved because the program gets “real results.”
“They’re an incredibly passionate group and they have a very successful, tangible program,” he says.
“Sometimes [nonprofits] need a lot of money to fund themselves. Sometimes they have a lot of bureaucratic red tape to get through. And sometimes they have a good idea but not a good way to carry it out. Homeless Backpacks is a great exception to all of those things. So no matter if you’re funding it or if you’re serving in it, there’s a great return on your time or money. You see the impact in feeding hundreds of students every week.”
Kelly Wilson, chair of the Homeless Backpacks board and one of the founding members of the group, says last year the program served 315 high school and middle school students per week and they’re well on their way toward similar numbers this year.
The program has been successful enough to inspire a similar program that launched in Grays Harbor just last month.
“It has been our vision from the beginning that we inspire other communities to take care of the homeless students in their community,” Wilson says.
Set up to provide extra food in a convenient and non-stigmatizing way, kids pick up food packed in a discreet bag each week at their schools. The bags contain enough food for the weekend, including items such as milk, cereal, oatmeal and fruit, filling a critical gap for students who depend largely on school breakfast and lunch programs for meals.
Boyd says he likes that students don’t carry around bags emblazoned with the nonprofit’s name or logo, an essential detail that protects student privacy. He’s also impressed with the nuts and bolts of the program: school counselors and health room workers identify kids in need and set up locations for distribution.
Ground zero for Homeless Backpacks is a house in Lacey where the group stores food, volunteer teams pack bags and volunteer drivers pick up the completed bags to distribute to local schools.
The group’s yearly auction raises funds to help fulfill their mission to “End the Cycle of Homelessness, One Student at a Time.” This year’s event will take place at the Thurston County Fairgrounds on November 10th. Wilson says the fundraiser is “critical to our program since we aren’t supported by any government grants or other large funding sources.”
If fundraising is the backbone of the program, then the hands and feet are kept in motion by groups such as Fountain Church who show up month after month to pack bags and, occasionally, help keep up the property.
Two of Boyd’s children often join in, filling their spaces in an assembly line formed on either side of end-to-end conference tables. His youngest started at age eight, the youngest Boyd recommends for this project. Now she’s a natural, he says, placing items such as aseptic containers of milk, boxes of macaroni and cheese and cans of ravioli into bags bound for homes that may otherwise have bare cupboards. In all, the group completes about 500 bags in an hour and a half or less.
Asked how other groups might get involved with the program, Boyd is quick with a handful of simple ideas.
He encourages groups to help with bagging and shopping for food. Individuals who have daytime hours can deliver food to schools. Faith-based or community groups can sponsor a food drive.
But he also suggests groups get out the word and raise funds in creative ways. Simple fundraisers, such as an acoustic concert the church gave at a local coffee shop, can make a big difference to Homeless Backpacks. Their donation-based event raised about $300.
Even simpler is the concept of highlighting the organization at an existing event. Boyd suggests inviting representatives from Homeless Backpacks, allowing them a moment to explain their program from the stage and providing a table in the lobby where they can answer questions or sign up volunteers.
“We sometimes overcomplicate the process,” says Boyd. “If we have a desire to help, usually there’s someone we can partner with and put in some hours. If everybody saw how easy it is to take some hours and give it to somebody else then I think a lot more of these things would flourish and a lot more of these students and the situations they’re in could change.”
(360) 628-8631
Details on the Fall Fundraiser are available on their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/HomelessBackpacks
(360) 280-7113
info@fountainchurch.com
