Keep AISD Kids Fed

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We said #KeepAISDKidsFed, you all fed the kids now can you help us  pay folks who actually fed the kids?

Help us support the restaurants & the local austin food supply chain by reaching our 115,000 goal! 

After accounting for slightly fewer meals than originally anticipated, we’ve lowered our goal to $115,000, and we’re over 75% of the way.

 

As motivation, the national nonprofit One Fair Wage is challenging Austin to hit this new lower goal, matching community donations, dollar for dollar, all the way up to the big goal!


This means we only need $14,166 more from the Austin community to close the book on this campaign and call it a success.


We have extended our fundraising timeline to continue working to ensure that the restaurants and farms aren’t left holding the financial burden for feeding our community’s students. Help us get through this last stretch of $14,166!


Collectively the Austin community has raised over $85,000 to provide meals to AISD students during last weeks July 6th week long district closure. That’s was  more than 14,160 meals, or seven days of breakfast and lunch for 1,010 kids/caregivers, many of whom  live in a food insecure household.

 Our restaurant and farm partners really stepped up last week and committed to providing the resources to make sure we had enough meals for every family who came to pickup.

Now we need help, even though the week is done and meals have been made and distributed, we are continuing to raise funds towards our goal to make sure that our local farms and restaurants that stepped up to make this possible are supported and covered.

Update 7/10 - The week is done, and we did it! We supplied meals for the students of every parent and caregiver who came out to the pickup sites at El Buen Samaritano and Springdale General this week. Now we need to make sure the hard costs of food procurement and distribution, and the hard work of our restaurant partners, are covered!

We are working on our post-campaign report and we are planning to share stories, photos and numbers on how the week went as we compile it next week.

Update 7/6 - The City of Austin Office of Sustainability challenged the community with a $2,000 match, which was unlocked within hours of posting. We’re past $85,000; let’s go, Austin!!!

Update 7/3 - With the gracious support of Texas Mutual’s $5,000 matching gift, we,ve passed $70,000!!!

Update 7/1 - We’ve passed $60,000! Help us share the campaign online with the hashtag #KeepAISDKidsFed - we’re also excited to share that the campaign will be spotlighted tonight on Austin Fox 7 News at 9pm!  

Update 6/29
- We’re excited to announce that together we’ve unlocked a $31,000 match provided by Austin Ed Fund’s AISD Crisis Support Fund! This will bring us to over 50K raised and almost half way to feeding all 1,400 kids.



Please help us share and promote so we can reach our goal of feeding 1,400 kids!




Why we are doing this:
During the summer months Austin Independent School District provides approximately 44,000 meals per week to over 1,400 students in need. However this year the district closure from July 6th to July 10th has a meal gap where these students will no longer have access to this support.

In past years local food banks have been able to support this gap, however with the pandemic the gap is in need of some community resources. This is where YOU can help!!! We need Austin to rally together to keep AISD Kids Fed. Our big vision wish goal is $120,000, which will give us the resources to secure 20,000 meals for 1,400 students to have seven days of breakfast and lunch. We recognize the immediacy and importance of these kinds of emergency food resources in a time where there is so much need. We also know that every little bit we can do as a community counts.

We’ve been able to activate local community networks and nonprofit partners quickly, and have secured the partnerships of local restaurants, producers, farms and logistics experts.The funds secured will be used to procure and prepare the meals for AISD students through partnerships with Good Work Austin members L’Oca d’Oro, Colleen’s Kitchen, Contigo, Henbit (Emmer and Rye Group) and Easy Tiger


Every $6 donated feeds an AISD student a locally made, nutritious and nourishing meal; helps keep local restaurants open; helps employ Austin food service professionals impacted by the Pandemic and helps keep Austin dollars in the local economy.

24 hours in to our camping we hit our first $5,000 bench mark where we as a community unlocked a $5,000 match donation from Emergency Food Network. This was a huge morale builder! We are currently working to find other matching partner organizations. If your organization is interested in making a matching pledge, please contact us!

With your help we can bridge the meal gap next week and make sure these kids are fed.



The good news is, we are not alone in this effort. The Central Texas Food Bank will be ramping up production of student meal packs and distributing them across 11 sites in central Austin. They have the capacity to provide a significant number of meals next week, around 45% of the expected gap. Travis County funded Keep Austin Together program will also be providing meals to many students in need, through their partner organizations. This collaboration will support their already energized work and aims to cover the remaining 50% of the expected meal gap.

We are asking for community members to donate one ($6), two ($12), three ($18) meals or more, to help us ensure our community‘s most vulnerable students are fed.

In tandem with our public fundraising campaign, we’re asking local community leaders, business owners, organizations and foundations to pledge matching donations, in recommended increments of $900 (150 meals), $1,800 (300 meals), $6,000 (1,000 meals), $12,000 (2,000 meals) and $24,000 (4,000 meals).

The meals will be provided to students at partnering distribution hubs, including El Buen Samaritano and Notley’s Springdale General during this week while the district is closed.

If we are able to raise additional funds beyond our goal of $120,000, we will be able to offer caregiver meals as well. We only have a short window to raise the funds needed, as this is happening next week.

With your help, we can make sure these students have something so basic, yet so important - good, healthy food. In this time of so much uncertainty we are motivated to give these student a sense of meal security.

Will you join us and pledge to Keep AISD Kids Fed?



Thank you for your time and support for this community-led initiative.
We are also excited to share that our local partners have some thank-you gifts for you!

We have chosen the GivePulse platform for this fundraiser to ensure that your donations have the greatest impact possible. With a
2.9% payment processing fee and a 1% platform fee that's invested back into the community. GivePulse maintains the lowest rates in the industry, making sure that your gifts go directly to the causes you care about. You can ensure that 100% of your gift goes to our organization by covering processing fees at checkout. (GivePulse is also a local Austin company!)”

For donors over $50.00 our community partner TASTER'S TABLE CLUB would like to provide you with a free membership!

Since 2015 Taster’s Table Club has brought food lovers together into local restaurants for good conversation and better food at our memorable monthly dining experiences. During normal times each month members choose from select restaurants offering exclusive tasting menus for the club that showcase items from their daily menu.  The club affords voracious, adventurous foodies a forum to sample the multitude of new eateries springing up in the city along with tried and true greats.  Currently, we are showcasing local businesses and chefs through virtual classes.

If you donate $50 or more we will be sending you a special email for this offering.



For donors over $100 our community partner EXO would like to thank you with a sampler pack of their signature cricket protein bars (yes, made from crickets farmed here in Austin!)

We make cricket protein bars that are designed to give you that extra spring in your step that you need to take on the world. Whether you’re hiking your favorite trails or simply biking home from the office, our protein bars are here to give you the fuel you need to get through.

If you donate $100 or more we will be sending you a special email for this offering at the end of our fundraiser week. 



For donors of $200 or more our community partner Naturally Austin would like to thank you with a Naturally Austin Bundle full of delicious and innovative products from local entrepreneurs!

Naturally Austin’s mission is to stimulate conscious growth, foster sustainable and responsible entrepreneurship, and develop exceptional leaders while growing the Central Texas natural and consumer products ecosystem.

Donors will get a  choice of one of these four bundles, filled with delicious local natural products - “Snack Attack,” “Good Morning,” “Adventure”, or “Sweets,” bundle. We will send out these codes in our follow up thank you emails at the end of our fundraiser week. 


We want to thank all of our community partners, organizers and donors for the teamwork that has happened to get us this far; this is an action of love, community and hope.

Special Thanks to:
Keep Families Giving Foundation
12 Rivers Realty / Todd B Realty
Community Resiliency Trust
Big Wheelbarrow & EmergencyFood.Network

The Austin Ed Fund’s AISD Crisis Support Fund
Texas Mutual
El Buen Samaritano
Notley Ventures
Get Shift Done
Naturally Austin
EXO
Taster’s Table Club
Austin Board of REALTORS
City of Austin Office of Sustainability 
FOOD SUPPLIERS & RESTAURANTS 

Eden east Farm
In the Garden Farm
New Leaf Farm
B-5 farm
F-Stop farm
Buenna Tierra Farms
DiLorio Farms
Gundermann Acres
Good Work Austin
Easy Tiger
Henbit
Colleen’s Kitchen
L’Oca d’Oro
Contigo


Please contact us if your business or organization would like to join us in our community effort to help feed Austin’s students in a time of need.


With appreciation & hope,
Keep AISD Kids Fed Team
Iffy, Adam & RNA



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