Angels’ Place 

Organization’s Mission:  to provide exceptional family support and quality early childhood education to help parents in need and their children to become lifelong learners and create a brighter future.

Program Description/Goals:  Angels’ Place provides high-quality early childhood education, childcare and family support to thousands of single parents and their children.  Nutritional coordinators provide a hot homecooked breakfast and lunch, as well as two snacks, for children in their care, at no cost to families.  The program recognizes that children learn best when they are properly nourished and developing healthy eating habits, while at the same time reducing the financial strain to parents on a limited income.

Bible Center Oasis Project – Better Food, Better Me 

Note:  G2G funded BF,BM in 2017 

Organization’s Mission:  The mission of the Oasis Project is to create oases—places of peace, safety and happiness in the midst of trouble and difficulty.  Their goals are to provide programs and services for Homewood youth with a particular focus on education, employment and entrepreneurship; to create community-based businesses that employ young people and Homewood residents; and to acquire and redevelop vacant and abandoned properties in Homewood. 

Program Description/Goals:  BF,BM uses a holistic approach to teach Homewood  and Lincoln/Larimer elementary and middle-school students to understand the life cycle of food, the value of good nutrition, and the importance of learning to cook foods that will improve health and well-being.  Three separate sessions (Spring, Summer and Fall) are held by the Oasis Project’s Farm Manager and after-school staff, supplemented by guest chefs, nutritionists, dieticians and urban farmers.  The students are given the opportunity to learn not only how to use healthy, fresh ingredients, but how to grow them in a sustainable way using hydroponic and aquaponic systems.

Fayette County Community Action Agency – Let’s Get Cooking! 

Note:  G2G funded FCCAA in 2017

Organization’s Mission:  FCCAA’s mission is to strengthen individuals and families to become more self-sufficient, achieving their potential by taking advantage of opportunities, improving the conditions in which they live, and taking ownership of their community.  Our promise to the community states that “Community Action changes people’s lives, embodies the spirit of hope, improves communities, and makes America a better place to live.  We care about the entire community, and we are dedicated to helping people help themselves and each other.”

Program Description/Goals:   FCCAA has worked hard to increase the availability and quality of food in underserved neighborhoods and food deserts, but they have come to understand that access is simply not enough.  FCCAA’s Let’s Get Cooking adds preparation and cooking of healthy foods into their client visits, offering guidance and support to pregnant women in Fayette or Greene Counties, and continuing on for two years after the children are born.  Nurse Home Visitors make home visits and help families identify their needs and develop a strategy to address those needs, drawing connections to other community resources.

Feed Our Students 

Note:  G2G funded Feed Our Students in 2018 

Organization’s Mission:  to help end childhood hunger and improve student learning through our Backpack Feeding Program. This program provides 6 meals to students over the weekend who suffer from food insecurity and it gives them the proper nutrition they need in order to concentrate on their schoolwork and not being hungry.

Program Description/Goals: There are many students in Pittsburgh who qualify for free or reduced lunch and have access to food at school for breakfast and lunch.  These same students lack food over the weekend during the school year, so by providing them with weekend food for 6 meals, they receive the proper nutrition they need and can concentrate on their schoolwork and not being hungry. 

Hilltop Urban Farm 

Organization’s Mission:  to create and sustain a new, regional asset in south Pittsburgh’s Hilltop community, that is committed to growing food, growing farmers and growing a community.  Hilltop Urban Farm will benefit its neighbors by being a catalyst for community pride and reinvestment.

Program Description/Goals:  The one-acre Youth Farm at Hilltop Urban Farm, located in St. Clair, engages children ages 3 to 19 from the Hilltop communities with nutrition, cooking, growing food, local food systems, agriculture as a pathway, and ecology of western Pennsylvania education through the lens of urban farming.  They conduct summer camps and an additional “farm week,”  as well as an after-school partnership with Pittsburgh Arlington PreK-8 School, New Academy Charter High School volunteers, and the “farm Fridays” partnership with after school programs at Lighthouse Cathedral.

LeMoyne Community Center 

Organization’s Mission:  The LeMoyne Community Center is developing, shaping, defining, and stabilizing our community with education, arts, health and recreational programs. 

Program Description/Goals:  LeMoyne has implemented the Nutrafit Program, modeling the Steps for a Hunger-Free Community (H. Con. Res. 302).  Their year-round education programs for low-income under-served youth in Washington County have four objectives:  food identification, food preparation, food medicinal effects, nutrition label interpretation.  Every other week, youth are expected to try a new food product.  In addition, LeMoyne provides 36,000 meals annually at 18 sites (churches, schools, community centers, low-income housing plans and playgrounds).

Rainbow Kitchen Kids Cafe’ 

Organization’s Mission:  Rainbow Kitchen Community Services is committed to improving the quality of life for low-income families and individuals through programs that address hunger, child nutrition and supportive services.

Program Description/Goals:  The Kids Café program provides approximately 95 children per day in West Mifflin and Homestead with a hot, balanced, nutritious daily dinners that include fresh fruits and vegetables.  Last year they began offering afternoon snacks for children at the Homestead Carnegie Library after it was discovered that community children used the library as a safe and secure place to go after school or in summer afternoons, but they arrived hungry.  Rainbow Kitchen provides the children’s’ families with information about the other programs and services (such as Food Pantry and Breakfast programs, Case Management for families with immediate or crisis needs) and long-term guidance and support as they work to achieve self-sufficiency.

United Methodist Church Union Kids Meal Network 

Note:  G2G funded Kids Meal Network in 2017 and 2018

Organization’s Mission:  to transform communities, lives, and hearts.

Program Description/Goals: Kids Meal Network provides free, nutritious hot meals for vulnerable children in Greater Pittsburgh during the out-of-school summer months when kids from underprivileged and economically-challenged home environments are at risk of going hungry.  KMN plans to seve an anticipated 16,00+ nutritious hot meals and snacks next summer to kids who’d otherwise likely go without a hot meal and go hungry.  KMN also provides a safe haven and refuge for children from volatile and unstable home environments.  Their locations provide fun and stimulating activities for the kids.

Whitehall Presbyterian Church Food4Kids 

Note:  G2G funded Food 4 Kids in 2018