DYER BROOK, Maine — Full Plates Full Potential, Maine’s only statewide childhood hunger organization, has announced RSU 50 as the Aroostook County 2018 Summer Food Program winner.
Thanks to the contest, the district will receive a $500 summer food grant to support the coming summer’s meal program.
Full Plates launched its inaugural 16-county competition to highlight the critical work summer food programs do reaching the 82,000 children who qualify for free and reduced-price school meals.
“We are so proud of RSU 50’s summer food program. This [past] summer they served 3,003 meals, which is an increase of 62 percent over 2017,” said Anna Korsen, Full Plates Full Potential’s program director.
“Summertime is an extremely challenging time for children who are hungry,” Korsen said. “Our 16-county grant program goal was to showcase and reward the best of summer programs across our state.”
“We’ve been serving summer lunches for over 10 years now,” said Gayle Glidden, school nutrition director for RSU 50. “The school nutrition staff is extremely dedicated to feeding kids in the summer. They love their jobs and they love the kids.”
Maine has 123 summer food service programs with 450 meal sites across the state. In 2018, a total of 727,238 summer meals were served statewide.
Full Plates Full Potential began in 2015 and is Maine’s only statewide child hunger organization. The organization partners with other hunger relief organizations, granting funds and providing technical support to schools and nonprofits and working with chefs, businesses and others to end child hunger.
Learn more at www.fullplates.org.
