Nearly 50% of students in our local school districts are eligible for reduced school lunch programs!

That’s a staggering statistic and the main driving point to Cortland Loaves & Fishes’ School Backpack program. Loaves & Fishes currently funds and delivers food items for weekend meals to eight local schools, to address the food insecurity issue in our community. School social workers, teachers, and in one district student volunteers fill backpacks with food each week, and those at-risk students take those backpacks home for meals for themselves and siblings.  These programs receive NO STATE OR FEDERAL FUNDING and are totally supported by individual, business, and organization donations.

These school backpacks programs have become our second largest budget item and serve the Cortland, Homer, Dryden, Moravia, McGraw, Cincinnatus, and Tully school districts. Approximately 40,000 meals will be distributed this year enriching the lives of  over 1500 students.