Naropa Hunger Project

What we do: Naropa Hunger Project is a student-run community action program supported by the Naropa Community Studies Center. The goal of the Naropa Hunger Project is to address the issue of food waste and hunger in our community, by establishing a sustainable program for food donations and distribution, as well as a resource for families, which supports them in becoming food secure.

Who we partner with: Naropa Hunger Project provides a pantry and distribution site for groceries from Community Food Share’s Feeding Families Program, to families of Whittier Elementary School who qualify for the free lunch program.

Who we are:
Orien Star
Robyn Wodiuk

How we got the ball rolling: In the interest of providing information to other students who might want to start a community action project of their own, below we detail the process we went through to launch this program:

• We identified our interest: Hunger in the Boulder community
• We met with Community Food Share representatives at the Naropa Resource Fair
• We asked what Community Food Share’s needs were and examined how that fit in with our goals.
• We discussed the possibility of becoming a distribution site for Community Food Share’s Feeding Families Program.
• We toured Community Food Share’s facilities and learned more about the program and discussed the specifics of the Naropa Hunger Project’s role.
• We researched local schools that had the highest need for a food program (as defined by the proportion of students qualifying for free lunch).
• We chose Whittier Elementary School.
• We talked to the dean of students at Naropa and submitted our proposal to become a student group.
• We met with and asked for SUN’s support.
• We talked to Facilities and acquired a space on the Naropa campus to store food.
• We contacted Whittier Elementary School and sent them letters (in English and in Spanish) to hand out to their students, informing them of the program.
• We put in our food order to Community Food Share and talked to the Transportation Office to reserve parking spaces on campus for our first distribution.
• We had our first distribution.
• We evaluated the results of our first distribution and made plans to address its limitations in subsequent distributions.
• We came up with a rough timeline for the implementation of future distributions.