Food for Neighbors ensures those in need can feed their families
 |
| Food for Neighbors volunteers at Jackson Middle School. |
Since the COVID-19 pandemic is leaving so many more parents out of work and struggling to feed their families, the nonprofit group Food for Neighbors is stepping up its efforts to fill that void.
The organization recruits volunteers to donate food and grocery gift card to students at 22 schools, including Jackson Middle School which serves students from the Annandale area.
“Food for Neighborhoods hosts humongous Red Bag events in Northern Virginia five times a year,” says Renee Maxwell, one of the original volunteers at Food for Neighbors.
People who sign up are given a red bag with a list of about $25 dollars’ worth of non-perishable groceries. The volunteer shops for the items and leaves the full bag outside their front door. Another volunteer picks it up and drops off another bag for the next collection.
Volunteers, organized by neighborhood, bring the full bags to a school in a central location, where the food is packaged and organized for weekly distribution to families.
Food for Neighborhoods also gives out grocery gift cards during the holidays. This fall, the group raised $33,000 for gift cards given out for Thanksgiving. “We could easily spend $15,000 to $20,000 a month for gift cards if we had the money,” Maxwell says. “There’s such a need for this.”
 |
| A Red Bag event at Jackson Middle School on Nov. 7. |
The pandemic has been challenging, she says. The group had to cancel its Red Bag event in May. “We were able to continue by partnering with area churches to help store, pack, and distribute food and continue deliveries through the summer.” Due to families’ financial hardships, the group increased the amount of gift cards from $25 to $50.
School counselors and social workers recommend children who could benefit from the program,” Maxwell says. “What’s so nice about that, it allows counselors to build a personal connection to students.”
Food for Neighbors was founded in 2016 by Karen and Mark Joseph. At the time, Karen was president of the Herndon Middle School PTA. When she learned that one in four children in Fairfax County, one of the nation’s wealthiest counties, goes hungry every day, she decided to fill the gaps not served by other food programs.
While children in need rely on the free and reduced-price lunch program during the school day, they are vulnerable to hunger on weekends and evenings. And while there are other organizations that provide food for elementary school children and their families, students in middle and high schools were neglected.
When Food for Neighbors started, it served 100 students at Herndon Middle School and Herndon High School. In 2016, the Red Bag program collected 550 pounds of food from 60 households.
The program now serves 1,200 students at 16 schools in Fairfax County and four in Loudoun County.
The most recent Red Bag event, in November 2020, collected a record-breaking 16,904 pounds from over 1,070 households. Another 650 people volunteer as drivers and sorters.
Food for Neighbors can use more volunteers, especially in the Falls Church area. Learn more here.