This Halloween, we are encouraging our school community to participate in "Halloween for Hunger".
In March 2009, nearly 800,000 Canadians turned to their local food bank for a meal. Over one-third of them were children. In 2008, over 49 million Americans struggled daily to put food on their tables. In our own communities, many people face hunger as a daily reality.
Families throughout North America and the UK are trapped by unemployment or low-wages and the crippling costs of housing and food. Under the stress of poverty, parents have to make impossible decisions between a roof over their family's head and food in their stomachs.
Every year on October 31, young people trick-or-treat with our Halloween for Hunger campaign, collecting non-perishable food items instead of candy to donate to local food banks. One of Free The Children's two local campaigns, Halloween for Hunger gives young people the opportunity to help end hunger in their own communities.
Last year, youth from 408 schools donated 217,713 pounds of food to their local food banks. That's enough to feed 2,221 families for a week, or 555 families for a whole month!
Let's go Leslie Frost Lions!
