5 Loaves 4 Kids

5 Loaves 4 Kids (5L4K), established in October 2007, is a local non-profit organization that provides weekend food to 215+ critical needs students in pre-K through middle school in Tullahoma City Schools (TCS) system. Every Thursday community volunteers pack and deliver the food bags to each school. On Friday, teachers place the bags in the childrens’ backpacks to take home. All items are single-serving, non-perishable food that requires no cooking, electricity, water or a can opener as these things are often lacking in homes of children of dire poverty.

Impact:
Children who are hungry on the weekend are not ready to learn.  They keep an anxious eye on the clock counting the minutes until snack or lunchtime.  Teachers spend valuable teaching time locating a pack of crackers or a carton of milk for a hungry student. Nurses’ stations are filled with children with stomach aches simply due to hunger. Cafeteria workers witness children gouging their cheeks with food as fast as it can be consumed. Physical Education teachers see listless children not ready to join in important fitness activities.

Children who have enough food on the weekend are different. They are ready to focus on learning. They are eager to stretch, run, tumble, leap and play. They energetically engage in PE class. They are not worried about food. They are not stressed due to hunger.

The bag of food provided by 5L4K is small but it can have an enormous impact on a child’s life.  We will continue to work hard to raise both funds and community awareness so as to give hope to our children where weekends are filled with laugher and fun, not despair and worry.