Blog
December 2024: The Latest from PORCH
- Want to volunteer with PORCH? We have simplified volunteer sign-ups and now provide more details about the events, so you can choose what is best for you! You will love volunteering at the new Community Hub. Get more information.
- Your generous support has made a huge impact this year! You enabled us to say “yes” to an additional 100 families who were referred to us for our monthly hunger relief program. We are now serving over 700 Chapel Hill and Carrboro families. Next year, we expect that over 150 new families will request our support. The PORCH Community Hub gives us the physical capacity for this growth. Can you chip in?
- Children who are experiencing hunger perform worse in school, are sick more often, and have more social and behavioral problems. That’s why PORCH started the Food For Schools program – to get healthy snack foods into the hands of children who need them the most – so they can attend classes and focus on learning. PORCH supplies all 21 Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools as well as the district-wide pre-K program and two after-school programs with snacks to address this issue. The FFS program provided $23,497 in snacks to our schools in 2023. Learn more.
- Teamwork is central to the PORCH model, as volunteer neighborhood coordinators look to neighbors to donate non-perishable food – which the coordinators then collect and transport. In Fox Meadow – a neighborhood consisting of about 60 houses on large lots off Rogers Road in Chapel Hill – a team of two couples share the workload as neighborhood coordinators. Read our profile on these incredible volunteers.
- “I’m making soup!” Eight-year old James bounced up and down, barely containing his excitement. He and his mom were shopping at the new PORCH Community Hub during our first distribution.
“It’s going to have carrots! And garlic, onions, and potatoes. I got it all over there!” James pointed to our long line of produce tables where participants can now select their own fresh vegetables and fruits. “Oh, and chicken! I got that over there!” James motioned to our new freezer, which now enables us to distribute meat.
“And we need tomatoes, James. Come pick some out,” his mother reminded him as she stood next to our shelves of non-perishable groceries, where our participants can choose the products that are best for their families.
The Grand Opening of our new PORCH Community Hub on November 14 was a warm celebration of community and collective action, but the true highlights were moments like this with James and other shoppers – families browsing and planning meals together, children making friends while playing at the kids’ table in our lobby, and so much appreciation and enthusiasm from shoppers.
With the new Hub, we’re leveraging partnerships to serve more families in even deeper ways.