Corra Gassner from the Kamloops Food Bank fills backpacks with food for children across School District 73 (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By Chad Klassen

KAMLOOPS FOOD BANK

Starfish Backpack program feeding 200 children as school year begins

Sep 14, 2022 | 4:06 PM

KAMLOOPS — For the last six years, the Starfish Backpack program has been feeding school children in need.

Every week, the child receives a grocery bag full of food from the Kamloops Food Bank.

“It hits their hearts when they hear children don’t have food, and I think that’s something for all of us that’s impossible to understand. There are children in our communities that don’t have food when they go home,” said Kamloops Food Bank executive director Bernadette Siracky.

It’s estimated one in six Canadian children, or 1.15 million across the country, go hungry. It’s where initiatives like the Kamloops Food Bank’s Starfish Backpack program fill the need, a program started by the late Christopher Seguin in 2016.

Starfish operated during the pandemic, but is fully back to normal this year.

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“Every Friday, we are packing and delivering up to 200 backpacks into our school district,” noted Corra Gassner from the Kamloops Food Bank. “This year, we have 15 schools in our communities that these backpacks are going out to.”

The kid each receive a new backpack that’s filled with nutritious items for every meal such as oatmeal, granola bars, fruit cups and pasta.

“We’re packing these bags with really great nutritious, easy-to-prepare food for these kids — things they can easily make themselves for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks,” said Gassner.

The demand has been growing every year since it launched in 2016. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the food bank has seen a jump in its adult clientele as well as children.

“The need that we’re noticing at the school district this year is matching what we’re seeing generally in the community,” said food bank executive director Bernadette Siracky. “People are recovering the last couple years financially. [We’re] really seeing a need increase here and with the children at school.”

With a passion for feeding children, Starfish Backpack is one of Corra’s favourite programs at the food bank and she says the community support has been amazing.

“The way they have been supported and rallied behind the program is so incredibly moving,” said Gassner. “The corporate sponsors, the business groups, the service clubs, the individuals that have come forward to sponsor and volunteer with the program — I’m so appreciative. It’s so moving.”