Student reporters from Saint Andrew’s Middle School tour Food For The Poor

As field reporters and community service volunteers, 19 students from Saint Andrew’s Middle School held a “mud cookie” from Haiti and learned what it means to be destitute in a developing country while touring Food For The Poor’s headquarters in Coconut Creek, Fla. on March 2. Their mission was to bring awareness about the agency and the wider international community it serves to their peers on the Boca Raton campus.

As an introduction to Food For The Poor, the group was shown a video documenting the charity’s 30 years of service to the destitute. The ministry, through its dedicated donors, has built more than 77,000 homes, sent more than 60,000 containers filled with essential goods to the 17 countries it serves, and has delivered more than $9 billion in aid since its inception. Optimistic about the challenges that lay ahead, Food For The Poor shared its goal for 2012 to build 12,000 homes, dig 1,200 water wells, and ship 1,200 containers of food to help the destitute.

During the group’s orientation, they heard about the harsh realities of life in developing countries and firsthand accounts from the South Florida-based charity’s President/CEO, Robin Mahfood. One of the photos shared with the group was of a young Nicaraguan girl. Mahfood explained how destitute families do not enjoy the luxury of access to water in their homes with the simple twist of a faucet. As part of their daily chores, little girls in developing countries often have to carry heavy water buckets on their heads for miles over rocky ground to gather water for the family to drink, cook and clean.

“Her chore of fetching water perpetuates poverty,” said Mahfood. “If you are not educated, it is hard to rise above a life of poverty.”

Through the installation of water wells in remote villages, and the implementation of school feeding programs, students from Saint Andrew’s learned how the charity is working to eradicate poverty – one person, one family at a time.

Michelle Blum, one of the Saint Andrew’s faculty members, said the idea of not having access to clean, safe water is hard for most people to imagine.

“Tonight, I ask all of you to tell your parents that you are a philanthropist,” said Paul Kane, Food For The Poor’s Manager of Church, School and Community Development. “To be a philanthropist means, to love human beings. We at Food For The Poor do all that we do because we love others.”

The orientation concluded with a tour of Food For The Poor’s facility and distribution center.

You can learn how to involve your school in Food For The Poor’s mission by calling 1-877-654-2960, ext. 6641 or emailing churchschool@foodforthepoor.com.

Food For The Poor, the largest international relief and development organization in the nation, does much more than feed millions of the hungry poor in 17 countries of the Caribbean and Latin America. This interdenominational Christian ministry provides emergency relief assistance, clean water, medicines, educational materials, homes, support for orphans and the aged, skills training and micro-enterprise development assistance, with more than 96 percent of all donations going directly to programs that help the poor.

For more information, please visit www.FoodForThePoor.org.

Contact:
Jennifer Leigh Oates
Food For The Poor
Public Relations
954-427-2222 x 6054
jennifero@foodforthepoor.com