PINEVILLE, Mo. -- MC4Kids, an organization that supplies students with food, clothing, and additional goods and services, is seeking more community connections this year to be able to better serve students through resources available in the county.
MC4Kids, which was originally a part of Brighter Futures, became its own organization to more specifically allocate funds to McDonald County students. Through the program each school has a food pantry and backpack program for the students. With the backpack program, students receive a backpack of food each Friday as well as over long weekends and breaks. Leslie Kasischke, president of MC4Kids, will meet with each student that she can through the school year to see if they have any unmet food-related needs in addition to teachers referring students to the program through the year.
This year, MC4Kids received a $25,000 grant from Tyson to be allocated specifically toward food pantries located at each school. The organization has just more than $3,000 for additional needs such as clothing items, vision products, dental products and other needs students may have. Volunteers who wish to donate any food, goods, clothing, additional items or monetary donations can contact Kasischke at Anderson Elementary School or message the MC4Kids Facebook page to be placed on an email list where unmet needs will be shared with additional volunteers and donors.
Kasischke said the goal of the organization is to offer each student what they need to be successful during the school year.
"I would tell you that I feel like the main focus of our organization is to just making sure that our kids within the district have what they need to be successful in school," Kasischke said. "There's always something that falls on hard times, and there's something that can be done. Our biggest thing that we have seen is the food instability."
Kasischke said in addition to working to combat food instability, she wants to partner with local organizations to offer more services to students.
"I would really like to see us get to a point where we are working more closely with resources in the county and just being able to help develop that rapport with parents that, even if they don't know how to help their kids, we can figure out how to get them to where they can help their kids," Kasischke said.
Kasischke said one of her goals is for students to feel comfortable coming to her, or other school staff, in times of need. She said whether students need food, don't have power or don't have running water at home, the organization will do what they can do to help and find resources to further aid families in need.
"It's hard to ask for help when you need it," Kasischke said, noting that she wants to help families when they're feeling overwhelmed.
Michael Shaddox, a counselor at McDonald County High School, volunteers to work with MC4Kids and is in charge of the food pantry at the high school. Shaddox said anybody who wants to help MC4Kids should contact their school or Kasischke. Shaddox added that if individuals or organizations would like to make a monetary donation, there is an MC4Kids account at the Central Office that individuals can donate to.
Shaddox added that if anyone would like to donate food or clothing to McDonald County schools, their donations would go a long way.
"Food and clothing are kind of the big things that we need," Shaddox said. "We're not going to turn anybody down. Bring food to the schools, and we'll use it."
Shaddox said schools will always need more food to send home to students as food security in McDonald County is rampant.
"We have a lot of need," Shaddox said. "We have an entire community that has a lot of that need."
If individuals interested in aiding the program are unable to donate, Kasischke encourages community members to contact their schools to see what can be done. Kasischke said one of the tasks volunteers help her with is preparing food bags to be sent home with students each Friday.
For more information, updates on meeting times, or to be placed on the MC4Kids email list, go to the MC4Kids Facebook page for continued updates from Kasischke and additional MC4Kids staff.