Dear Community,
Today, and every day, The Sylvia Center works to empower students, families, and communities to take control of their health and wellbeing. The communities we serve often face increased challenges with food insecurity, a scarcity of healthy options, and a lack of support systems needed for change. Throughout 2020, COVID-19 exacerbated these inequities all too clearly.
At The Sylvia Center, we know food justice is racial justice.
The Sylvia Center has been working to become more actively anti-racist and to continue to live by this ethos. We have expanded our programming to reach more students, and partner with other community organizations to provide additional resources for remote learning and overall wellness.
The Sylvia Center has also taken the following steps to ensure that our organization continues to be inclusive and welcoming to all:
- Successfully launched our Equitable Food Access Initiative that connects our communities with fresh food meal kits full of vegetables, fruits, and other goods to supplement our virtual programming. In Fall 2020, we distributed over 650 fresh food meal kits, and are slated to distribute an additional 400 over the coming weeks.
- Our team continues to collaborate with community chefs and partners to create culturally diverse recipes to use in our virtual programming.
- All recipes and related materials are currently being translated into Spanish to help us reach more students and families.
We are committed to food justice and to helping build healthy futures for young people and the communities they live in. We look forward to sharing our successes with you in 2021!
Yours in good health,
Jonathan Cetnarski
Executive Director
Read The Sylvia Center’s Newsletter here.
