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Share Our Strength Receives $325,000 Grant from The UPS Foundation
Supports goal to end childhood hunger in Florida and Washington State.
Washington, DC, May 23, 2007 - Share Our Strength, one of the nation’s leading organizations working to end childhood hunger in America, received a $325,000 cash grant from The UPS Foundation, the charitable arm of UPS (NYSE: UPS). The grant is a two-year commitment from The UPS Foundation to support Share Our Strength’s work to end childhood hunger in the states of Washington and Florida, as part of its goal to end childhood hunger in America.
“Our approach is to tackle childhood hunger measurably starting with states that have the most children at risk of hunger,” explains Share Our Strength Managing Director, Patricia Nicklin. “We are tremendously grateful for this grant from The UPS Foundation, which will allow us to develop bold action plans in two high-need states—Florida and UPS’ home state of Washington—and begin implementing those plans over the two-year term of the grant.”
Nicklin received the first payment of the grant, a $150,000 check, from UPS CEO Mike Eskew at UPS’ 100th anniversary celebration at its regional headquarters in Laurel, MD.
“Giving back to the communities is an important part of UPS’s 100-year-old culture,” says Lisa Hamilton, president of The UPS Foundation. “It’s embraced by our employees through volunteerism, making donations and sharing their unique skill sets. Share Our Strength shares this philosophy, and together we will work to make a positive impact on the lives of people in need.”
Specifically, The UPS Foundation grant enables Share Our Strength to work with a wide range of partners to build the systems needed in local Florida and Washington communities to increase the participation of children and their families in programs that alleviate childhood hunger and improve the level of child nutrition. These programs include school breakfast, after-school and summer meals, and Women, Infant, and Children (widely known as “WIC”) programs; food stamps and nutrition education; emergency food assistance, Earned Income Tax Benefits, and better access to healthy foods.
Share Our Strength believes that it can surround children with access to healthy, nutritious food by providing them and their parents with the opportunity and information they need about outstanding programs that already exist, such as the Food Stamp program. Through the increased participation of eligible children and families, Share Our Strength hopes to increase the amount of federal reimbursement to organizations that implement these programs in both states.
Share Our Strength will also be working with two of the leading statewide anti-hunger organizations, Florida Impact (Tallahassee, Fla.) and Children’s Alliance (Spokane, Wash.), to lead and sustain these efforts.
“We have based this plan on Share Our Strength’s national plan to end childhood hunger in America,” says Nicklin, “which was first implemented in Washington, DC last April. Our intent is, with continued support of organizations like The UPS Foundation, to adapt this national strategy to each state and its own individual needs, strengths and infrastructure as we move across the country to end childhood hunger.”
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