WORCESTER ― When Julie McDonald was volunteering at Elm Park Community School, she noticed that students were often going home hungry.
“I was with a group of students in first grade, and a little girl was looking in my purse and asked me if she could take a granola bar I had in my purse,” McDonald said. “That kept happening, and I eventually asked the school staff if there were a lot of students like that, and they said yes.”
Those moments led to McDonald to found the Juniper Outreach Foundation, a nonprofit focused on ending student hunger. Since 2020, the foundation has provided food pantries in eight different Worcester public schools, providing food access to students and their families. On Wednesday, the foundation opened its latest location, at the new Doherty Memorial High School.
“We had been talking to Doherty for quite a while, while the new building was being built, and we were hoping to put the pantry into the old school, but the space wasn’t available,” McDonald said. “So when they built this new school, they designated this space specifically for the foundation.”
The Doherty pantry contains nonperishable food items with a special focus on items for children. They include juice boxes, individual-sized snacks and cups of preserved fruit, as well as personal hygiene items like toothbrushes, tampons and laundry detergent. The pantry also has blankets, sweaters, sweatpants and other emergency clothing items for students who may be in need of them.
Food such as ramen, macaroni and cheese, and pastas can be prepared in a microwave by someone with little to no cooking experience, a necessity when providing food to high school students who may be feeding themselves and younger siblings.
“There is a story every single time, where you can’t believe this takes place in our own backyard. For example, when I first got here today to set up, a teacher told me how a student had mentioned to them that the student’s primary caregiver was in the hospital, and he had no food,” McDonald said. “The teacher came in, packed him a bag for the night, and he now has food for the evening.”
Never-ending fight to combat student hunger
The Doherty pantry is a project between Juniper Outreach and the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce, funded by a donation from the Fairlawn Foundation. McDonald said her goal is to have a pantry in all 32 public school buildings in Worcester.
“This is our eighth pantry and we’d love to open another one, so if anyone has any ideas for funding, please let me know,” McDonald said.
The other schools in Worcester with pantries are Burncoat Preparatory School, Lincoln Street School, City View Discovery School, Elm Park Community School, Vernon Hill School, Gerald Creamer Center and South High Community School.
In 2022, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that about one in five students in America is classified as food insecure, which can impact learning. Doherty Principal John Staley said he was thrilled that the pantry area was part of the designs for the new school, to help meet the growing need.
“It was nice that we were able to include this space in our designs for the school, knowing what the need is for this and that it is ever growing,” Staley said. “We were able to recognize that this building not only needs to be able to meet the needs of our students but meet the needs of our community.”
Mayor Joseph Petty said McDonald and her team’s work is going to continue to be needed in the city, particularly due to uncertainty coming from the federal government. Already this year, Worcester Public Schools have lost $180,000 in funding for subsidized school lunches as part of widespread cuts to USDA aid programs.
“Unfortunately the need hasn’t stopped, it is getting bigger in the community today. You don’t know what the federal government is going to do, and you are going to be needed in the future, unfortunately,” Petty said.
If you are interested in donating or volunteering for the project, contact Julie McDonald at juniperhelps@gmail.com.