A Lichfield secondary school has said up its own “mini foodbank” to help struggling families.
Nether Stowe School will distribute support packages before Easter.
Headteacher Glyn Langston-Jones said the initiative was designed to support those facing challenges in the current climate.
“We had a conversation with the leadership team at the school and looked at feedback from our pastoral team who had contact with families, and we were able to identify a number of issues with students coming back to school.
“What we found was that some of our more vulnerable families had really been affected by lockdown and needed that little bit of extra support.
“So, we have launched our own mini foodbank with generous donations from parents and businesses”
Glyn Langston-Jones, Nether Stowe School
The foodbank will be based on the school premises in St Chads Road, and will distribute food to more vulnerable families, as well as providing items of uniform where needed.
“These are families who have struggled through this second period of lockdown, and we have had a great response after appealing to the school community to donate items.
“We have been collecting the goods over the last couple of weeks.
“Our sixth form pupils will also be helping to organise them into packages and parcels that we can then hand out, and then we will distribute them in the final week before Easter.”
“I think this amazing response illustrates how the broader school community has really come together over the last year.
“As a relatively small secondary school, our place in the community is really important to us and we are proud to support each other through the challenges of the pandemic.”
Glyn Langston-Jones, Nether Stowe School
The foodbank will be open for community access from 3.30pm on Wednesday (31st March).
Let’s hope that they check the recipients of the food parcels are genuine ? I don’t believe smokers or car drivers should be receiveing charity food for the deprived residents ? Some genuine poor pensioners are too proud to go and collect charity food whilst others visit EVERY food Bank in the area !!
Grumpy Old Man wants people using Food Banks to be means tested on how poor they are. I wonder if he is actually Fabricant’s alter ego? His comments certainly read like something our out of touch backward MP would say.
SB – I accept what you are saying and it does sound like him, but it cannot be our MP. As he’s a narcissist he would not only put his name to the comment, but insist on having a thumbnail photo too.
In other news – congratulations to the pupils and the school for creating the mini foodbank. It is shameful that such initiatives are necessary at all, but this is a great effort from a group of pupils who show more social awareness than the majority of Conservative MPs and it appears Tory supporters.
Foodbank deniers should feel ashamed of themselves. But they won’t.
Lichfield secondary school creates “mini foodbank” to allow government to continue shirking its responsibilities. – fixed the headline for you.
Stories like this are always presented as feel good stories, they should be a source of national shame.
Even more remarkably they prompt hatred against food bank users.
That’s the English for you, protect those who have more than they could ever need, attack those who have the least.
Well done to everyone involved in this worthwhile initiative. These young people are a credit to their community.
@Scribbler… The ideal society should be able to offer all citizens reasonably paid work. The problem has been that industry has moved to China and India and the likes. There are few mass employers outside of government state funded jobs now. There are no effective trade unions who can challenge rates and conditions. Zero hour contracts (because employees like flexible working options?!) And a minimum wage, which in reality is a glass ceiling, are only two examples of many that epitomize the changes bought about in a generation. Few apprenticeships, of any quality, and NVQs in skills that are not skills but allow cheap labour before qualification; and then moved out to allow for the next batch!
I wish I knew the answer! It is partly why people working in poorly paid or part time work still need community help. Well done Nether Stow. I hope you study the reasons behind the ‘unacceptable face of capitalism’ which causes you to make your generosity. The coming months will need it more than ever when redundancies start to accumulate.