NEW DAY Arlington

A nonprofit organization

$41,247 raised by 142 donors

82% complete

$50,000 Goal

NEW DAY provides weekend food bags for Arlington Independent School District (AISD) students who live in food-insufficient situations. NEW DAY works with AISD school counselors to determine the number of weekly weekend food bags needed by individual AISD elementary, junior, and senior high schools. After the second week of school in Fall 2022, we were delivering plus 2000 bags a week to schools throughout our community.  By January 2023, we assessed our ability to provide food bags at an increased rate of asks for AISD students, and we capped our bag deliveries at 2231 bags per week for the remainder of the school year.  NEW DAY volunteers served 50 of the 75 school campuses in Arlington, or 67% of all AISD schools and we delivered a total of 66,169 weekend food bags.

The schools provide breakfast and lunch to many students each day, but on weekends there is no program to feed children that may be homeless or in homes that are at risk of food insufficiency and hunger. That is where NEW DAY fills the gap delivering individual bags of nutritious food to the schools that counselors and teachers distribute to those students in need.                                                

NEW DAY volunteers do all the work of buying the food items, preparing the sacks, and delivering the sacks to the schools. NEW DAY works out of four sites: Grace Presbyterian Church and St. John the Apostle United Methodist Church in southwest Arlington, Westminster Presbyterian Church in central Arlington, and Church of the Good Shepherd United Methodist in east Arlington. Money to support NEW DAY's work is given by individuals, churches, various foundations, and our annual participation in North Texas Giving Day.

NEW DAY's Beginning. In 2005, Tom Denny, a member of Grace Presbyterian Church, met with other Kiwanis members to discuss student scholarships. They decided to provide a "scholarship" to cover the cost of clothing for high school students. The principal they approached asked if the money could be used for food instead of clothing. At that time the Kiwanis members found out that there were over 1,000 homeless high school students in the City of Arlington. 

Tom talked about this issue with his wife, Janet, who asked for prayers for these homeless students in her Sunday school class.  Two members of that class Charlotte Sutton and Tamara Robb, determined to do more than pray. They went to grocery stores, purchased food, packed bags and took bags of food to Venture High School.  These were the first bags of NEW DAY food.

This service became a ministry of Grace and it continued for a couple more years. In 2013, the church volunteers decided it was time to apply for a 501(c)(3) tax exempt status so as to reach more people in the community to be involved with this mission.  Clearly, the need was real as weekend food bag requests were steadily increasing.   

NEW DAY's Work Continues, and the Need is Great. North Texas Giving Day is an integral part of our annual fund-raising campaign.  We have a limited number of financial resources we count on each year, but the growing need for weekend meal bags has impacted our ability to keep up with the demand. Additionally, the rise in the costs of goods has significantly challenged our ability to provide sufficient food items in our weekend meal bags.  We need your help. Please consider giving a monthly donation or one-time yearly donation to our cause.  The average cost of our current meal bag is $3.66.  With your help, we can meet our weekly delivery of 1100 bags throughout the school year. For example, a monthly donation of $100 a month will yield 27 meal bags per week or 108 bags per month.  A one-time donation of $1000 will yield 273 bags. The more donors we have, the more we can continue to address food insecurity among AISD students. Please help us reach our 2023 goal of $50,000.  

We can only exist with the help and donations of our volunteers and donors. We are forever grateful for our volunteers and donors past and current.  

Thank you!

Mission

NEW DAY provides weekend food to hungry students in the Arlington Independent School District.

Needs

During this past school year, we provided approximately 2,200 weekend food bags on a weekly basis. Last school year, we experienced an increase in the number of requests, as well as an increase in cost for food products we purchased and packed in the bags. Your donations to NEW DAY are especially important even now as we work to serve every hungry student, despite the increase in food prices, with weekly meal bags.

We rely on AISD school counselors and family liaisons to identify students who are hungry and in need of weekend food, as the latest estimate is that almost 70% of AISD students need some type of food assistance.

Volunteers are always needed to help maintain relationships with schools, purchase, pack, and distribute food for our weekend food bag program.

Equity Statement

Organization Data

Summary

Organization name

NEW DAY Arlington

Tax id (EIN)

80-0789676

Guidestar

Causes

Hunger, Food Access & Nutrition, Youth & Children

Operating Budget

$250,000 - $499,999

Counties Served

Tarrant

BIPOC Serving

Black or African American, Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic or Latinx, Native American

Address

Post Office Box 171722
Arlington, TX 76003

Phone

682-238-0338

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