With good nutritious food every day, children have a chance to concentrate in school, to grow up strong, to be anything they want. Sadly, an estimated 50,000 children in Southern Arizona are at risk for hunger.

Everyone should grow up with a chance to succeed. That’s why we have a multifaceted approach to erasing child hunger. We address hunger from infancy to adulthood through numerous programs that fill in the gaps where schools, food stamps and other assistance programs leave off. Here are a few examples:

• A pack full of child-friendly food for weekends during the school year.
• After school nutrition programs with snacks and education
• Sites where children can find healthy meals during the summer when school programs aren’t available
• Supplemental food for families in crisis

Below, there is a detailed breakdown of our three children’s programs. You can do more than you think for the children of Southern Arizona. Just $39 sponsors a child for two weeks of after-school and weekend programs. Please give generously,
children in our community need your help.

Snak Paks for Kids®
Children who a receive free breakfast and lunch at school often go home on weekends with no
guarantee of nourishment. Snak Paks for Kids® works with participating schools to identify children who are
chronically hungry. Every Friday these children go home with their backpacks full of healthy snacks to see them through the weekend. The packs also include information for the children and their families about nutrition, the services of the food bank, and Federal programs for which the family may qualify. Participating schools tell us that children are sick less often, have fewer stomach aches, and are more eager and able to learn. Currently 540 children receive Snak Paks for Kids®.

Summer Meals
Summer Meals works to feed rural children during the summer months when school is out and they
cannot receive a free breakfast and lunch at school. The Summer Meals program allows children to stay healthy and active over the summer, returning to school in the fall healthy and ready to learn. Summer 2007 saw 25,476 meals served in only eight weeks to children living in rural areas of Pima County. Over 300,000 children in the state of Arizona qualify for Summer Meals, but only about 20,000 of them receive them.

CFB Kids’ Club~Adventures in Nutrition®
At school, children eat lunch very early in the day. This means that by three o’clock they are hungry,
but dinner may still be hours away. For some children, there may not be any dinner at all. A healthy snack is the perfect way to help combat this hunger. Currently, the Community Food Bank serves 535 children five times a week through CFB Kids’ Club at seven neighborhood centers in Tucson. The program also teaches children how to make healthy food choices. Partners include the Tucson Parks & Recreation KIDCO after-school program and the University of Arizona’s Nutrition Sciences Department.