Local mum takes on “holiday hunger gap”

A LOCAL mother of two has launched a pilot program to help feed the region’s primary school children during the school holidays.

Named “Pass the Snacks”, the program aims to support families in the Greater Geelong region through what founder Deeann Cropley refers to as the “holiday hunger gap”.

The term encompasses families that may be supported through in-school initiatives and the generosity of teachers during the school term but find themselves struggling to keep up when those programs cease during school holidays.

She said the Christmas period, where the break between terms is closer to six weeks, was a particularly difficult time for families.

“The more I started to look into it, I realised that this holiday hunger gap is something that teachers have been aware of for a really long time and have just been doing their own in-kind support for these children and their families.

“A lot of these families are really struggling – some for the first time – to provide even the basic breakfast, lunch or dinner, let alone anything in between when the kids are at home for those school holidays.

“I just felt that it would be really tough and really heartbreaking for a lot of families to have the kids at home but knowing that for those couple of weeks, there’s just not really much left to spare in the cupboards or in the fridge.”

A lawyer by trade, Ms Cropley said an ongoing, sustainable program able to fill that holiday hunger gap and extend the support offered by food relief agencies and in-school initiatives had the potential to “benefit so many schools in the region”.

“I think that for us to expect that kids are going to be able to come back to school, refreshed with that extra spark, ready to plunge back into a new term of learning is unrealistic if…they actually haven’t got much food to sustain their growing bodies [at home],” she said.

Funded entirely by community donations, Pass the Snacks will provide snack food boxes directly to participating primary schools which will then be distributed to families in need during the last week of Term 1.

Cropley said each box will be filled with “kid-approved foods” including muesli bars, cereals, baked beans and rice crackers.

The pilot will launch this term and school registration will remain open until February 26.

There is no cost to schools to be involved in the program.

The only requirement to join the Pass the Snacks initiative is that the school be a government primary school within the City of Greater Geelong.

Should the pilot program prove a success, Ms Cropley said she would like to register Pass the Snacks as a charitable organisation and scale up the initiative to serve all primary schools in the region where families might be in need.

For now, she is seeking the assistance of local businesses and members of the community who are willing to donate non-perishable food items towards the snack boxes, or even organise a food drive.

To learn more about the pilot program, head to passthesnacksgeelong.com or follow its progress on Instagram @passthesnacksgeelong

To register a school, organise a food drive, donate non-perishable food items or enquire about the program, select “Register a School” on the website’s homepage and complete the online contact form.