“I’m obsessed with Michigan; I never want to leave,” laughs Pennsylvania-native and executive director of the non-profit program Kids Food Basket, Bridget Clark-Whitney. Moving to Grosse Point, Michigan, as a child, and growing up on the state’s east side, Clark-Whitney moved to Grand Rapids to attend Aquinas College.
The 2003 graduate excelled in her college studies and participated in a myriad of student activities. From her work as an officer in the student Senate, to her study-abroad experience in Ireland, involvement with various campus social-action clubs and onto her duty as a Student Ambassador, Clark-Whitney was anything but under the radar during her college years. It comes as no surprise, then, that what initially drew her to Aquinas College was the school’s pioneering new program in community leadership.
“I’d wanted to go to Aquinas because I loved that they were so centered and focused on civic engagement and community issues,” says Clark-Whitney. The community-leadership major at Aquinas College prepares its students for careers in public and non-profit management which was something Clark-Whitney found appealing. “I knew it was what I wanted to do with my life,” she says.
She recalls Mayor Heartwell, then director of the leadership program, contacting her at the end of 2002 with a concept for her final coursework. “The whole premise was to find an unmet need and meet it, work with an existing non-profit, or pioneer your own cause,” she says.
The mayor knew a woman in Grand Rapids who wanted to start a feeding program for undernourished children in the city but was short on time and manpower. Mary K Hoodhood, a community activist and director of volunteers at God’s Kitchen, had a serious concern for local children and was seeking someone to design, run, and recruit volunteers for a grassroots program aimed at feeding the nutritionally at-risk children in Grand Rapids.
The Hungry Here at Home
First hearing of this potential idea for her capstone project, Clark-Whitney didn’t think the program would present too much of a challenge. Imagining how there might be perhaps 50-100 undernourished children in the city, she remembers excitedly telling herself, “No problem! I can raise money, solicit donations…great!”
Clark-Whitney met with Hoodhood and the two discussed in detail Clark-Whitney’s newest challenge. In the non-profit world, though, financial and volunteer resources are always a commodity and Hoodhood was seeking someone to “run the show.” Being low on funding for the program, an ambitious intern like Clark-Whitney seemed a perfect solution.
The Kids Food Basket was soon born with their collaboration and started providing 75-100 local children a sack supper each night before they left school for home. “We had no money,” recalls Clark-Whitney, who split her time preparing these meals with volunteers at two churches on either end of the city. Her capstone coursework also required her to further research hunger in the country. What she found astounded her.
“I began to learn what a huge need this was,” she says. Researching the hunger levels in children under the age of 12 in the country, state, and county, Clark-Whitney knew she’d stumbled into a much bigger crisis than anyone locally might have grasped. “Thousands of Michigan children eat lunch as their last meal of the day. This made me realize this wasn’t something I could graduate from Aquinas from and just move on. This was big. We realized this was a responsibility we had.”
Learning the negative effects of undernourishment on both the physical and emotional development of these children, Clark-Whitney set out to tackle the problem on a much larger scale. Selecting a permanent site on Butterworth SW in Grand Rapids, the Kids Food Basket increased its serving capacity and allowed the volunteers a little more elbow room in their food preparations.
“We became an incorporated agency in 2003 and made it a goal to provide dinner to all nutritionally-at-risk children under 12 in Grand Rapids.” With the worsening economy, Clark-Whitney explains that, in Michigan alone, there are 456,000 children identified as food-insecure in the state. As the state’s second largest city, Clark-Whitney understands many of those children are right here in Grand Rapids.
A Team Effort
Under Clark-Whitney’s spirited guidance and now, just five and a half years after its inception, Kids Food Basket has a full-time staff of three people and hundreds of volunteers. Each week day during the school year and summer, approximately 1,300 Grand Rapids’ elementary school children receive a 1,000 calorie sack supper from the organization. Currently serving 11 schools, Clark-Whitney explains she has 16 additional schools on a waiting list for her program’s help.
“People call every week about us serving from all over the state,” she says. “But it’s very difficult. It’s a huge burden of responsibility to feed those 456,000 children.”
The volunteers, though, are the driving force to keep her spirits up and the staff motivated. With more than 1,000 volunteers, the program provided 213,000 meals in 2007. “Our volunteers are the most versatile group I could ever even imagine,” she says. Ranging in age from “5 to 105,” Clark-Whitney says the most treasured aspect of the program is seeing the sheer number of people from all backgrounds and walks of life coming to the city’s Southwest-side center to help.
The volunteers include professionals working in business suits, bank employees, church, temple, and school groups, Girl Scouts, law firms, bridge groups, scientists, student councils, and every social and economic group in between all helping to make more than 1,300 sandwiches a day.
“These people spend an hour and a half with us because they are concerned about kids having dinner,” Clark-Whitney says. “I get so passionate about our volunteers but there is so much diversity and a high degree of dedication. This isn’t about just one group of people. Childhood hunger is a community issue and it’s a community’s responsibility.”
Donated time, talent and resources are the backbone of the organization. Clark-Whitney is eager to expand the reach of Kids Food Basket. “I think that we’re going to be able to grow and meet the growing needs. There are still a few thousand in the greater Grand Rapids area in need of this service.”
With about 75 different volunteers working tirelessly daily from 9 AM to 9 PM, Clark-Whitney is always proud to see her new home town realizing the direct need the non-profit group is attacking. “Grand Rapids is a great place. There are awesome people here,” she says. “So many people are willing to serve to make it even better.”
Sarah Kommer, a graduate from Aquinas College, lives and works in Grand Rapids. She last wrote for Rapid Growth about the new
Founder's Brewing Company.
Photos:
Sign here...the walk-in cooler is a wall of signatures from volunteers
Bridget Clark-Whitney
Jane Berkey (operations manager) pushes juice drinks
1419 lunches were prepared and distributed on the day the photographer visited
High school volunteers prepare pudding packs for packing
Photographs by Brian Kelly - All Rights Reserved
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