Skyline Feeds Skyline

Food insecurity, while already a problem in Utah, has become much worse due to COVID-19.  With many people losing their employment, paying for food is an even more difficult task. However, there is hope in programs like Skyline Feeds Skyline. Ginette Bott, the President of the Utah Food Bank, told The Salt Lake Tribune, “These school pantries are really doing a great job,” Bott said. “It’s been incredible. … people really needed somewhere to go.”

The goal of Skyline Feeds Skyline is to eliminate food insecurity at Skyline and to create a safe and happy community in which everyone is well-fed. It provides free meal bags to families struggling with food insecurity at Skyline. Taylor Khater, a teacher at Skyline and the creator of Skyline Feeds Skyline, was enthusiastic about the program and said, “Skyline never needs to spend another weekend hungry!”

The program provides food not only for the student in need but for their family members as well, and requires no face-to-face interaction to sign up. A link is available on the Skyline website that leads to a google form to sign up for the free food. The form is simple and short, and gives a date to pick up food from the counseling center. 

Responses to the increase in hunger because of COVID-19 are likely to persist even after Utah reaches herd immunity and returns to ‘normal,’ which will help to create stronger trust and hopefully a dramatic decrease in food insecurity. The Salt Lake Tribune noted, “Gina Cornia, executive director of Utahns Against Hunger, hopes the pandemic — by seeming to have finally made hungry people visible — will lead Utah to consider comprehensive solutions at last.” It’s possible that this could be a future positive result derived from the very thing that caused the original suffering. 

It is important that initiatives like Skyline Feeds Skyline are readily available to the student population because school communities can feel closer to home and more accessible to students and their families.