A delicious and nutritious grant update!
Skokie School District 69’s Fresh Market Program, which gives food items to district families who face food insecurity, is partnering with Advocate Health Care on a brand new initiative funded through a Skokie Community Foundation grant. The program is offering dry food goods, cooking equipment, and cooking lessons for families to prepare healthy meals at home. District social workers identified 50 families in need to be recipients of the program.
On Friday, March 7, SCF Board Members Fernanda Perez, Carolyn Anthony, Bob Quane, and SCF Executive Director Jim Szczepaniak volunteered alongside D69’s Matt Pumanes and Sarah Rankin to box up the food and cooking supplies.
Skokie Community Foundation Board Secretary Fernanda Perez attended one of the cooking classes held for the program participants.
“In the District 69 cooking class,” Fernanda shared, “we learned how to prepare and cook Italian wedding soup! We had about 8 tables with families cooking together. The instructor was experienced and helpful in teaching us how to properly follow the instructions and how to use the cooking utensils! We were provided with the ingredients and learned how to properly chop up veggies and cook the meatballs. At the end we all enjoyed a hot bowl of hearty soup. We clapped at our success and left with a copy of the recipe along with a container of our leftover soup to take home. It was very enjoyable.”
Thank you to our grant partner The Education Foundation Supporting the Students of Niles Township for supporting this grant alongside us. We are also grateful to Niles Township Government for sponsoring SCF’s portion of this grant.
