BVSD students and families step up to give back to the community

Last week, we shared great stories about all the wonderful accomplishments of our staff who have stepped up to the challenge of supporting students and families during this crisis. Our students and families have done the same, seeking out ways to also give back to the community. BVSD provided families two opportunities to give back in easy but meaningful ways through existing programs- Trip Tracker and the School Food Project.

BVSD students raise more than $16,000 for local Nonprofits by donating Trip Tracker Dollars.

More than 500 BVSD students, who participate in the Trip Tracker Program, responded to the challenge to donate their accumulated Trip Tracker dollars to support local non-profit organizations providing food to families in need. As a result, the BVSD No Student Hungry program, Community Food Share, Sister Carmen Community Center and Boulder Food Rescue will receive a total of $16,450. This donation also includes generous matching funds from Alfalfa’s Markets and the Boulder-based Innovo Foundation.

Trip Tracker encourages and rewards students and families for using alternatives to single-family car transportation to BVSD schools. The program goal is to significantly reduce car traffic and associated air pollution in front of schools thereby enhancing student safety and health. 

Program Director, Peter Hurst, was delighted by the outpouring of gratitude from parents and students for this opportunity to help provide support to fellow community members in need during the COVID-19 crisis. 

“My girls are thrilled to donate as they continue to ask how else they can help people in need, said BVSD parent Evan Frankel. “ I believe we’ll move permanently in this direction for all future Trip Tracker dollars, as they have gotten more joy out of donating the past 4 weeks than an ice cream cone or book could ever provide. I just don’t think we realized that we have a ziplock bag of ‘money’ that could also help out.”  

1250 families and counting transfer their unused lunch funds back to the district

At the start of the crisis several, people asked if they could transfer their lunch funds back to the district. The Food Services team then made it happen and launched their campaign for families to donate their unused funds back. 

As of Wednesday, 1250 families have signed up to transfer their funds back. While the full total amount tally is still pending, at the 700 family mark, over $19,600.00 funds had been transferred back to the School Food Project. These funds will be used to support the Food Distribution program which is feeding families while schools are closed and will be continued into the summer.

"We're grateful for families who decided to donate the remaining balance in their meal accounts to other families in the district who need food assistance right now," says Ann Cooper, Director of Food Services. "The cumulative impact of each individual's decision is massive and will support our program as we continue to feed families into the summer months."

Since school buildings closed, the Food Services team has been distributing bags of food on Tuesdays and Thursdays in 7 locations across the district, serving over 235,000 of meals to date.

 

For more information about the food distribution program, check out the website at food.bvsd.org.

To donate your unused lunch funds, click here.