Fuel for Success- Weekend Meals for Hungry Kids (2025-2026)
How can a child concentrate on solving a math problem or spelling a new word when their stomach is rumbling from hunger? For too many kids, weekends are a long stretch without reliable meals—and the hunger they face makes it nearly impossible to learn, grow, or thrive.
That’s why Food Now created the Fuel for Success – Weekend Meals for Hungry Kids program, a cooperative effort with the Palm Springs Unified School District to fight weekend hunger and nourish the potential of every child.
Through this program, schoolteachers, counselors, and staff identify chronically hungry students—children who rely on school meals during the week but face empty cupboards at home on weekends. In response, Food Now delivers backpacks filled with shelf-stable, easy-to-open, age-appropriate food items, designed to mirror the nutritional support they would normally receive at school.
Each weekend backpack includes enough food for two breakfasts, two lunches, and two snacks, following USDA guidelines for a healthy diet. It’s more than a meal - it’s a lifeline, a source of comfort, and a chance for a child to show up on Monday morning ready to learn.
Children's Backpack Weekend Meals Program (2023-2024)
How can a child concentrate on solving a math problem or spelling a new word when they can’t ignore the constant hunger pangs rumbling in their stomach because they haven’t had a real meal all weekend long? The Food Now Children’s Backpack Weekend Meals Program is a cooperative effort between Food Now and the Palm Springs Unified School District to address childhood hunger and help feed hungry kids on the weekends.
Food Now partners with local elementary schools to provide chronically hungry children, identified by schoolteachers, counselors, and staff, with additional nutritional support for them to take home on weekends.
Food Now provides backpacks loaded with the equivalent of the meals children would normally receive from school during the week but do not have access to on weekends. Backpacks are filled with a weekend supply of shelf-stable, easy open, and age-appropriate food items based on USDA recommendations for a healthy diet.
Contact: Dana Johnson
Email: dana@foodnowdhs.org
