Hunger Week Collects Over $20,000 Of Food
The warehouse has been slowly filling up over the past two weeks with the conclusion of The Eliza DoLittle Society [TEDS] second annual ‘Making Hunger History’ week. The island wide food drive is over but for their volunteers, the real work has just begun.
The initiative gained overwhelming support from the community, with over 57 companies and organisations participating. TEDS Executive Director, Margaret Ward, has counted around 200 boxes of donated food thus far; with much more still to be collected. Volunteers have been collecting and sorting the food and conservative estimates put the running total at well over $20,000 of food.
“We collected more boxes last year, but this time around we’re finding boxes overflowing and fuller”, explains TEDS Executive Director Margaret Ward. “The amount of food and response from Bermuda has been remarkable.”
What was new this year was the amount of people wanting to participate. Many not only collected food and participated or volunteered in the event but also raised funds with their company matching money raised.
There was also an increase in schools that participated. Getting the event into schools allowed them to reach a demographic [and through them parents and teachers] that they haven’t reached before.
Bermuda High School, Mount St. Agnes, Saltus Grammar School, Sommersfield Academy, Warwick Academy, Dalton E. Tucker Primary School, Stepping Stones Preschool all participated in the food drive. Many did a talk during assembly about TEDS, hunger and the growing problem in Bermuda along with the food collection.
All donated food will be distributed to charities that provide meals and/or food supplies year-round to Bermuda’s hungry and needy. These charities include The Coalition for the Protection of Children, The Salvation Army, Centre Against Abuse, and TEDs own Daily Bread feeding centres and Adopt a Senior program.
“120 boxes have been distributed so far, with a lot more to come,” says Ward, “We are hoping that by Friday, all the charities will have their food.”
Other charities to receive food include Focus, Summerhaven, Star and numerous churches throughout the Island. Bags of food prepared specially for families and senior citizens have also been prepared for use at feeding centres.
Adding to the food drive, TEDS put on their first ever Zumbathon to raise funds and awareness. The two hour family event had a variety of instructors donate their time and teach Zumba for a good cause. With over eighty people attending, the event was a great success.
“Thank you Bermuda,” Says Margaret, “Together, we can make sure no one on the Island ever goes hungry.”
hip,hip,hooray for TEDS.! well done!
Bermuda is blest to have such an organization and it is good that we reconize them for the hard work they are doing and will continue to do but lets make sure we dont come short of reconizing that this is an every week occurance that takes place in several of our local churches and charities. I say that with respect and not to down play what these folk are doing but then you would have the joker that comes along and may or may not say where is the church and why arent they doing it,so before that happens let me say that they are and they do.
So to all ocal churches and charities we say thank you because many Bermudian families would not even know where the next meal is coming from if it had not been for you and yes Bermuda this is were we are in this country right now even though it gets down played big time,all you got to do is ask the social assitance department how many applicants they have turned down for one reason or the other and them same folk have to look else where to feed,clothe and house themselves.
We live in Paradise but the Bermuda is another World years are long gone.we are a part of the global family and the dream is now reality.
@Duane..why don’t you give it a rest with your defence of ‘the church.’ What church besides the Salvation Army does anything regularly to help the unfortunate in our community??? ‘The Church’ does something every now and then but for the most part all they worry about is increasing their membership to pay off mortgages on bigger and bigger buildings to hold more members to pay more money in tithes to buy bigger buildings still. Oh-and to allow the pastors to live like kings and drive expensive cars.
This is great. Let us have this moment to reflect on what a success this drive has been without bringing mention of ‘the church’ into this for five seconds, shall we…
BTW-Besides your numerous misspellings, you must be the only person who’d say ‘blest’ and not ‘blessed’…this is 2012, you know.
Many of the churches in Bermuda assist on a regular basis – to name just three – St. Mary’s Warwick has a Soup Kitchen every Wednesday, St. John’s in Pembroke has a food pantry and Christ Church in Warwick distributes food, so please do not make such uninformed sweeping statements.
@Responsible dog owner: My comment is not ‘uninformed’ at all. Kudos to the churches that do make an effort but for the most part most do not do a darn thing on a regular basis. Serving soup once a week doesn’t help moms trying to feed their kids every day. I will add St. John’s to the Salvation Army because I give credit where it is due and I have heard about them helping out as well…
I am talking about the majority who have these huge churches-both in physical size and in membership size-who do NOTHING or very little. They try and get people to come to their churches but who can hear the word of God on an empty stomach? Many of these churches have lost sight of what it means to be a Christian and it is disgusting.
I have a friend who attends one of the biggest churches here where the minister lives like a king and is so arrogant it’s not funny. Recently they made an appeal to their members to assist six families. Six? They could easily help many, many more yet six seems to be the magic number to ease the bishop’s conscience that he lives so well while people are suffering.
Anyway, my main point is to just give it a rest and I stand by my comment. Duane always has to bring ‘the church’ into everything. This article isn’t about them so why is he trying to weasel in credit for them? He has such tunnel vision…he can save talk of ‘the church’ for another time-geesh…
So that’s 3 and we have about 200 churches in Bermuda. Good statistics right there.
Mayan is correct and many of these pastors are arrogant narcissists only worried about lining their pockets with their church members money. Taking grand vacations and living the high life while people are suffering, including the members in their very own church. Duane does need to give it a rest and stop writing these essays on every article, every day about any and every topic. I guess he owes a debt of gratitude to the church for __ setting him straight.
LMAO “blest”
@Mayan, I am the founder and pastor of The Church Without Walls, I would not usually respond to such a posting, but for the record we hold a regular church service every Sunday on the street (at Bull’s Head car park) as well as other outreaches regarding the homeless and marginalised in our society. Every week we not only deliver the Word of God, but we also offer a full meal to all who attend. We give out clothing, toiletries etc. to all who require such.We are not alone, there are many churches who extend the love of God in such a way. They are unsung heroes during these trying times. Rather than complain and target the churches I invite you to come out and help! Tonight October 25, The Church Without Walls will be on Court Street offering soup and sandwiches along with personal prayers to any and all who come. Hope to see you there!
God Bless
I dont believe this campaign was promoted enough. I didn’t even hear about it and would have loved to have supported this initiative. Also why were private schools the primary target for this initiative. I’m certain if this orgnanization reached out to more public schools they would have collect far more items. Only thing that would be necessary is for them to reach out to get into touch with school PTAs or the schools directly to encourage students to make a donation of $1-$2 or to bring in a non-perishable food item – and its not to say that its too late for this to happen. This article does not even talk about how one can dontate to this awesome & much needed initiative.