Serving Breakfast To Our Community
When students leave school for the summer, many who rely on two to three school meals per day don’t know where their next meal will come from during those summer months. Toke Mayes saw a need and immediately stepped into action. As director of Nutritional and Environmental Services at Texas Health Hospital Mansfield, a venture between Texas Health Resources and AdventHealth in north Texas, he organized a cereal drive to assist families in need.
“It bothers me that in one of the greatest countries in the world, we have people, especially children, that suffer from hunger,” said Mayes. “If we can figure out a way to help with that, shouldn’t we?”
The Mansfield Mission Center (MMC), a local nonprofit, regularly hosts a market where families can shop free of charge. Thanks to expanded shopping hours, community members can stop by anytime between Monday and Saturday, with no appointment needed. The center, which relies heavily on donations from the community to make the market a success, is expected to feed approximately 4,000 individuals this summer.
“Cereal is one of the most requested items when children are out of school during the summer,” said Lindsey Trook, director of development for MMC. “It is something kids can prepare themselves and contains several servings.”
Texas Health Hospital Mansfield organized team members into five large groups for a friendly competition to collect as many donations of cereal as they could. Though the initial goal was to collect 10,000 servings of cereal, team members doubled their goal, raising nearly 21,000 servings of cereal in just two weeks. This is the largest cereal drive MMC has ever seen.
“Thanks to partners like Texas Health Mansfield, we can ensure that we are able to take care of families when children are home for the summer and when they need it most,” said Trook.
“Here at Texas Health Hospital Mansfield, our commitment to and love for our community runs deep,” said Faith Morse, marketing coordinator for Texas Health Hospital Mansfield. “As a result, we feel tasked with the duty to not only live our mission of extending the healing ministry of Christ within our hospital walls but also outside of them.”
“What we did isn’t going to change the world,” said Mayes. “But hopefully it has an impact in our local community and the lives of those within it.”
By Faith Morse, Texas Health Hospital Mansfield Marketing Coordinator
