Lift a Life Foundation Mobilizes 300,000 Students Nationwide with “Lead2Feed World Hunger Leadership Challenge” in Partnership with USA TODAY Charitable Foundation
Lift a Life Foundation announces 11 national winners of the “Lead2Feed
World Hunger Leadership Challenge” in partnership with USA TODAY
Charitable Foundation. St. Francis Episcopal Day School in Houston,
Texas, wins top prize and receives $25,000 from the Yum! Brands
Foundation for their local hunger relief charity.
Ashley Butler, Director of Lift a Life Foundation, left, presents the winners from St. Francis Episcopal Day School in Houston with a $25,000 grant after taking first prize for the Lead2Feed World Hunger Leadership Challenge on Friday. Life a Life Foundation, in partnership with USA Today Charitable Foundation, mobilized more than 300,000 middle and high school students in 1,500 schools nationwide to participate in the challenge that encourages students to hone their leadership skills through projects that focus on solving hunger. Yum! Brands Foundation will provide nearly $250,000 in prize money grants to 140 schools for U.S. public charities engaged in hunger relief programs. (From left to right: Ashley Butler, representatives from partner school, K.L. International School, in Meerut, India, St. Francis eighth grade winners, Ruth Zomalt-Burrell of Kids' Meals, Inc. and teacher, Debbie Harris)(Photo: Business Wire)
More than 300,000 middle and high school students in 1,500 schools
participated in the nationwide challenge that encouraged students to
hone their leadership skills through projects that focus on solving
hunger. Yum! Brands Foundation will provide nearly $250,000 in prize
money grants to 140 schools for U.S. public charities engaged in hunger
relief programs.
The “Lead2Feed World Hunger Leadership Challenge” is a teacher-led
educational program that combines a standards-based curriculum on the
topic of leadership along with the challenge of solving world hunger
through service learning projects conducted by student teams.
Students use principles from Yum! Brands’ Chairman and CEO David Novak’s
best-selling book, TAKING PEOPLE WITH YOU: The Only Way to Make BIG
Things Happen, and the Lead2Feed curriculum provided by USA TODAY
Education. In the book, Novak shares the secrets of the unique “Taking
People With You” leadership program he has developed and taught during
his 15 years at Yum! Brands. All of his proceeds from the book go to the
United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in conjunction with Yum!
Brands’ global hunger relief efforts.
St. Francis Day School in Houston, Texas, partnered with a school in
Meerut, India, to identify creative solutions to fight hunger in their
local communities and they shared best practices regularly via Skype.
St. Francis students packed 5,100 sack lunches, collected more than
6,500 cans of food and packed boxes at a local food bank while their
partner school in India volunteered time at a local orphanage. Students
at both schools planted gardens to deliver fresh produce monthly to
local charities. St. Francis Episcopal Day School is directing the
$25,000 grand prize grant to Kids’ Meals, Inc. in Houston, the state’s
only meals-on-wheels service for children who live in poverty.
“I am inspired by the leadership and creativity that students from
around the country used in their projects to fight hunger,” said David
Novak, Chairman and CEO, Yum! Brands, Inc. “Lead2Feed challenges
students to think and act like leaders, work with others and set big
goals to solve a real problem in our community and world. It is exciting
to watch the program develop the next generation of leaders who are
passionate about solving hunger.”
“We were excited to see so many teachers from different disciplines such
as agriculture, health, marketing, science and social studies
participate in the program,” said Diane Barrett, President, USA TODAY
Charitable Foundation. “The free leadership program can fulfill class
service project requirements that many school districts require for high
school graduation or as part of the middle school curriculum,” said
Barrett.
In addition to the national winner, highlights from the Top 10 Lead2Feed
school projects include:
-
St. Andrews Episcopal Academy – Fort Pierce, Florida: A team of
middle school students built a race car out of 3,500 cans of food that
was displayed at a car dealership to raise awareness for the hunger
issue.
-
Joseph L. Carwise Middle School – Palm Harbor, Florida: Seventh
and eighth graders collected nearly 1,000 cans of food for a local
food pantry in order to feed 1,800 local families in need.
-
Rio High School – Rio, Wisconsin: The elementary, middle and
high school students collected nearly 700 non-perishable food items
and hundreds of dollars for a local food pantry through a pie auction
and other creative contests.
-
Hale County Technology Center – Greensboro, Alabama: High
school students hosted a community food drive that raised 800 cans of
food and 400 cases of water for local senior citizens and at-risk
youth.
-
Rapid City Central High School – Rapid City, South Dakota:
Students raised thousands of dollars to provide bus passes, shoes,
coats, laundry vouchers, school supplies and other items for fellow
classmates in need.
-
Port Chester Middle School – Port Chester, New York: The middle
school team expanded their school garden to grow organic vegetables to
donate to a local food pantry. They anticipate more than 1,000 pounds
of food, 90 percent of which will be donated to local food pantries.
-
Mercy Academy – Louisville, Kentucky: A team of nine high
school students implemented everything from a Rice Bowl Campaign which
raised nearly $1,200 for a local hunger relief charity, to making and
selling bracelets for a local community center. They also launched a
fundraiser which raised more than $700 to purchase animals for women
in developing countries.
-
New World Bilingual Institute – Fairfax Station, Virginia:
Students did everything from dressing in traditional Chinese attire to
greet 30,000 attendees at a local parade to selling homemade Asian
food at a festival in D.C. They raised more than $700 to help provide
more than 1,250 meals to a rural village in China.
-
St. Francis Cathedral School – New Brunswick, New Jersey: A
team of seventh graders packed and delivered 150 lunches to hungry
people in their community. They also created and sold a cookbook
filled with nutritious, kid-friendly recipes.
-
P.A.T.C.H. (Parents as Teachers in Christian Homes) – Paducah,
Kentucky: A student team raised more than $900 to purchase bowls
for a fundraiser in their community. The students painted, glazed,
fired and washed bowls for the event which raised $12,500 to provide
nearly 600 meals for a local community kitchen.
Teachers are invited to register now for next year’s challenge at www.lead2feed.com.
The program can be followed on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Tumblr
through the links below:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Lead2Feed
Twitter: https://twitter.com/LeadtoFeed
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/lead2feed
Tumblr: http://lead2feed.tumblr.com/
For a complete list of winners, visit www.lead2feed.com
About World Hunger Relief
Yum! Brands annual fall World Hunger Relief effort is the world’s
largest private sector initiative designed to fight hunger. The effort
spans more than 130 countries and territories, 39,000 KFC, Pizza Hut and
Taco Bell restaurants and over one million employees, to raise
awareness, volunteerism and funds for WFP and others. Since World Hunger
Relief launched in 2007, the effort has raised nearly $150 million and
is helping to provide approximately 600 million meals and save the lives
of millions of people in remote corners of the world. Yum! also
addresses hunger through its Harvest program which has donated nearly
160 million pounds of food, with a value of over $700 million, to those
at risk of hunger in the U.S.
About Lift a Life Foundation
The Lift a Life Foundation was established in 1999 by David and Wendy
Novak to help individuals and families in need reach their full
potential. The Foundation helps alleviate the financial, physical,
emotional, and educational burdens that hold people back from achieving
their dreams and making a positive difference in society. The Foundation
focuses on creative partnerships that make a lasting impact in the
primary areas of hunger relief, education, juvenile diabetes, the
military as well as family and youth issues. Since Lift a Life
Foundation began, it has helped thousands of people in need through
grants and programming support. David Novak is Chairman and CEO of Yum!
Brands, the world’s largest restaurant company with more than 39,000
KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut restaurants in over 130 countries and
territories, and author of the New York Times and Wall Street
Journal best-selling book, TAKING PEOPLE WITH YOU: The Only Way
to Make BIG Things Happen. He has been recognized as “2012
CEO of the Year” by Chief Executive magazine, one of the world’s
“30 Best CEOs” by Barron’s for the past three years, one of the
“Top People in Business” by FORTUNE and one of the “100
Best-Performing CEOs in the World” by Harvard Business Review. He
is also the recipient of the national 2008 Woodrow Wilson Award for
Corporate Citizenship and is on the board of directors of the Yum!
Brands Foundation and World Food Program USA. Wendy Novak is a lifelong
philanthropist and volunteer, serving on the board of Directors for the
Kentucky Chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
About Yum! Brands Foundation and Yum! Brands
The Yum! Brands Foundation, the charitable arm of Yum! Brands, Inc.,
supports charities working primarily in the areas of hunger relief. Yum!
Brands, Inc., based in Louisville, Kentucky, is the world’s largest
restaurant company in terms of system restaurants with more than 39,000
restaurants in over 130 countries and territories. Yum! is ranked #201
on the Fortune 500 List and generated revenues of more than $13 billion
in 2012. The Company’s restaurant brands - KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell
- are the global leaders of the chicken, pizza and Mexican-style food
categories. Outside the United States, the Yum! Brands system opened
more than five new restaurants each day of the year, making it a leader
in international retail development. The Company has consistently been
recognized for its consistent shareholder returns, diversity leadership,
community giving and recognition culture.
About USA TODAY Charitable Foundation
The USA TODAY Charitable Foundation, a 501(c)(3) organization, supports
and builds alliances that enhance innovative, instructional programs and
community outreach by providing the resources to promote opportunities
and inspire all. It welcomes participation in efforts to engage,
enlighten and inspire today’s students and educators by opening their
classrooms to the real world. The Foundation seeks funding from other
foundations, private companies and organizations to help provide
educational programs for elementary, secondary schools, community
colleges and/or programs in specific disciplines or curriculum areas.
The Foundation works with interested parties to collaborate on the
creation of an educational program that meets the mission and goals for
respective companies or organizations.
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