Bringing hope to the poor

The annual Packing Hope program at St. Elizabeth Seton Elementary School, Rapid City, took place March 31. Administrators at the Rapid City Catholic School System started working with Packing Hope to answer Christ’s call to bring hope to the poor and vulnerable. 

The meal packs are specially formulated by food scientists to provide a well-balanced meal of easily digestible proteins, vegetables, carbohydrates, and twenty-one vitamins and minerals ideal for meeting the specific nutritional and developmental needs of those who are malnourished. The food packs have a shelf life of three years, contain six meals, and require only boiling water for preparation. 

The students, who along with a concerted effort by the STM National Honor Society members solicited the generosity of local parishes and Rapid City community, raised well over $38,000 and packed 195,264 meals surpassing the total number of meals packed last year by almost $30,000. 

The RCCSS has been working with “Then Feed Just One” since 2007 when Richard Sievert and his brother Francis Sievert traveled to Rapid City to share their program with the RCCSS faculty and students. Within weeks of their presentation, a team consisting of admin, teachers, and students was assembled and traveled to LeMars, Iowa, to witness a packing event. The following year, the RCCSS K-12th graders raised the necessary funds, TFJO hauled the bulk ingredients and equipment to Rapid City, and held the first packing event. TFJO (https://www.thenfeedjustone.org) is a non-profit, mobile-food-packing organization that distributes highly nutritious food to those suffering from hunger and malnutrition in Honduras and around the world.