Harvest United Methodist Church partners with Samoset Elementary in Bradenton to provide weekend care food packages for nearly 80 students at Samoset who have been identified by school administration as chronically hungry. Statistics show that hunger inhibits a child’s ability to concentrate on schoolwork. By providing nutritional food over the weekend, Harvest hopes to both alleviate hunger and help these children excel in school.

The Harvest Pack-a-Sack ministry packs and delivers individual servings of nutritious foods with pop-tops or other packaging that could easily be opened by a small child. The program is supported through the generosity of the congregation, including donations of food items or tax-deductible monetary contributions and corporate sponsorships. 

Contact Misty Pope at (727) 687-6361, mswpope@gmail.com.

The Pack-A-Sack mission of Harvest at Samoset Elementary School is “wrapping up” a very busy year. Every Friday, over 20 Harvest volunteers have provided between 60-90 bags of food for eligible students at Samoset. Because of our concern that we were not providing food for the long school breaks, in March we started providing a family dinner and breakfast which required some cooking along with the menu and a family game idea for the Spring break. Another meal was again delivered at Easter break. This food was provided by Harvest’s Tuesday LIVE! study group and was very much appreciated. Harvest has since been awarded both a Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch grant and an Alice W. Lockmiller grant to provide this program for five extended school breaks for 25-50 families for the 2012-2013 school years at Samoset. The assistant principal has also set up a food bank closet at the school which Harvest is helping stock and the pantry will be open most of the summer.




Because of our care and concern at Samoset and because the school has no PTA support team, a “wish list” became known....and through specific designated donations, the following wishes came true for Samoset:

• Holiday pencils for all the students
• 300-$1 coupons for food at McDonalds to be given out on award days
• 100 Beanie Babies for awards (given by a Rotarian)
• 50 track team T-shirts...and for the first time, Samoset came home from the country meet with 2nd place.
• Muffins, Starbucks, and key chains for 90 staff members
• Underwear, socks and pantry foods delivered

Thanks be to God that Harvest has the time and resources to serve Samoset children in so many ways! Pack-A-Sack volunteer servants and anyone interested in learning more about this ministry are invited to come to Harvest from 6:30 to 8:00 pm on Wednesday, May 16. The Pack-A-Sack team will be reviewing the past year and discussing future goals for this ministry which focuses on feeding chronically hungry children. We invite you to please join us at the May 16 meeting to find out what you can do!