Little ones — and not so little
at S. Nicolas

After weeks of discussion and trading notes last summer (2008), Feed My Starving Children, a Minneapolis-based non-profit, donated to the Mission a 20' container-load of prepackaged balanced meals — enough to provide a meal each school day throughout the year for the 400+ students, teachers & assistants in the three schools throughout the school year.  The packets contain a nutritionally balanced mix of rice, ground soybeans, vegetable protein, vitamins and minerals.  This food was absolutely free — at their warehouse in Aurora IL.  We "use-tested" a package of it at home.  Each packet is supposed to serve six.  We cooked one up.  Tasted it — edible, but not very interesting.  Added a bit of Haitian spices and it was very tasty.  Served three adults and two children (good eaters all!) as the sole dish for dinner one night, and had some left over for the next day.  Certainly a lot better buy than a box of Captain Crunch!

The container of food did indeed provide nourishment throughout the year (except at St. John Chrysostom, where supplies were exhausted early) for children (and teachers), most of whom would not otherwise have gotten a single solid meal a day.  The total cost for the year was about $10,000, nearly all of it raised in "special donations" tagged for the project.  The cost:  about $25 per child for the entire year, or about 12.5¢/ meal.  What a bargain!
Now for 2009-2010.  The problems are different.  We've been assured of another such donation, but due to limited availability of foodstuffs it may be very late in coming (as late as March of next year!). Result:  a lot of hungry kids.  There is a possibility we may receive a considerable contribution from the UN (by no means assured; talking stage only) of foodstuffs, but only for the primary students at St. Augustine's. This, if it comes to pass, will of course help greatly (and at no cost other than that of preparation & serving), but it will be far from sufficient.  So what can we do?  For my part, I will continue to explore other possibilities for food donations (pray for success!).  But with or without them, we need to feed these kids.  We did it last year; let's do it again!

$10,000 would go a long way!  That's only $100 each for 100 families.  And look what you get for your money! We'll use the money proportionally at each school, based on actual attendance, for purchase of foodstuffs in Haiti (to add to whatever we may manage to get donated), holding a portion in reserve for transportation of the donation from FMSC when it becomes available.  That way, there will be at least something (and we'll work to assure it's reasonably balanced nutritionally) for those hungry kids from the beginning of the year.

Received so far (19 July):  nothing, but I'm setting aside $1000 of general funds for this purpose

BALANCE NEEDED:  $9000

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