THE REVERE ADVOCATE – FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2022 Page 9 The Foundation Trust Challenge Match to Support Bread of Life’s Backpack Nutrition Program O ctober 10, 2022-The Foundation Trust is offering a challenge match to help support the expansion of Bread of Life’s Backpack Nutrition Program. The Foundation Trust will match up to $10,000 of funds raised for the program in 2022. The Foundation Trust is the leading sponsor of Bread of Life’s Backpack Nutrition Program, which provides snacks and nutritious food for school-age students in Everett, MA. The Challenge Match from the Foundation Trust will match 50% of every one-time contribution to the program in 2022, up to $5,000. In addition, the Foundation Trust will off er a 100% match of every recurring donation received during the year, up to a combined match of $10,000. These funds will enable Bread of Life’s Backpack Nutrition Program to grow to serve more students in need. Interested community members can learn more and donate by visiting: https://interland3.donorperfect.net/weblink/WebLink. aspx?name=E333299&id=41 To address a growing need for nutritious food for school-age students, Bread of Life distributes backpacks fi lled with food to Everett students on a regular basis each month. Bread of Life works with school principals and guidance counselors who identify students struggling with poverty and food insecurity and distribute the backpacks. Backpack Items include snacks, juice boxes, crackers, peanut butter, cereal, milk boxes, noodle bowls, and other non-perishable food items. Bread of Life also provides blankets, gloves, hats, socks, hand warmers, towels, toothbrushes and other supplies as needed. With the support of the Foundation Trust, over 5,000 backpacks have been distributed to Everett students to date. "It's disturbing to think about the fi nancial strain some parents are under week after week to pay REVERETV | FROM Page 5 ball games from this season. RevereTV has you covered. All games air live on the Community Channel, Facebook and YouTube, and they replay on TV in the following weeks. Watch past games on YouTube at your convenience. The Patriots took on Everett last Friday and play Somerville tonight at 6 p.m. After a little summer hiatus, the Human Rights Commission bills and make sure their kids are fed; the nutrition backpacks put good nutrition into the hands of the kids at school and help the rest of the family at home," said Gabriella Snyder Stelmack, Bread of Life Executive Director. "We are extremely grateful that The Foundation Trust is providing the challenge grant to grow this program." Dr. Joseph Spinazzola, Foundation Trust Executive Director noted that “we started this partnership with Bread of Life before the pandemic started, and unfortunately the need for the backpacks has grown considerably since that time. Bread of Life has risen to the challenge, and we are honored to be a small part of their tremendous work addressing food insecurity in our communities. Through this Challenge Match, we hope to assist Bread of Life in establishing lasting partnerships with individuals, families, and local businesses in Everett and the surrounding communities to ensure the sustainability of this vital program for years to come.” About Bread of Life Bread of Life Bread of Life is a free food program based in Malden, MA, that serves the communities north of Boston with evening meals four nights a week, two food pantries, grocery delivery to senior citizens, food delivery to homeless families sheltered in local motels and a Backpack Nutrition Program for Everett students. www.breadofl ifemalden.org About The Foundation Trust The Foundation Trust is a private operating foundation that partners with small to mediumsized New England nonprofi ts on new programming to better serve high-risk populations and elevate underrepresented communities. To learn more visit: https://www. foundationtrust.org/ is meeting again. The first fall meeting took place last Thursday. All municipal meetings air live on RTV GOV, which is channel 9 on Comcast and 13/613 on RCN. The Human Rights Commission meeting is now replaying but can be watched at any time on YouTube, where a Spanish translation of the meeting is also posted. Last week’s meetings also included the Conservation Commission and Commission on Disabilities. ~ GUEST COMMENTARY ~ Designating July 8 Emancipation Day in Mass. By Sal Giarratani I don’t know about you but I always read Bob Katzen’s Beacon Hill Roll Call. I don’t know when I didn’t love politics and history. The two are intertwined together going back to the Pilgrims now 400 years ago. As a full-time substitute teacher now, after being on the job as a police offi cer for 28 years, I believe our young people in school need to be taught civics in the classroom and also know a thing or two about our nation’s history. We would have many more voters showing up at the polls if we educated our children in school on the sacrifi ces given over the generations to get us to where we are right now. There is still room to make us better tomorrow, but we can only make that happen if we know what is in our past. Today in public schools across America, students are asked to stand if they wish for the Pledge of Allegiance. ASKED TO STAND IF THEY WISH? Doing so is not indoctrination, it is understanding how lucky we all are living here. We should WANT to stand not as a meaningless gesture but as an affi rmation of who we are and what we believe. There is a lot of complaining today about our so-called jaded past. We are not members of a perfect nation. We do however continue to aspire for a nation with “liberty and justice for all.” Always our goal. We struggle hoping each succeeding generation moves us closer to bringing more life to those inspired words. There is a lot of confusion about our country’s greatness. Many today have decided to just b*^#@ about all the things we haven’t accomplished because we never live up to the words in that Pledge, or in historical documents like the Declaration of Independence or in the Bill of Rights. America is in constant change. Hopefully, we will always be changing and growing to being the very best that we can be. The America of 2022 is not the same as the America of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. History means learning from the past and moving beyond it but never forgetting it either – our journey to being better than what we were. We don’t have to be ashamed of anything in our past. We must learn from it as we progress onward into our future. Getting back to the designation of July 8 as Massachusetts Emancipation Day has nothing to do with those who would cancel culture but would add to our history. Back in my boyhood school days there were lots of things we were never taught. However, those things we didn’t know still happened. My dad always told me you never stop learning. There’s always something we don’t know yet. I never heard of Quock Walker. I grew up during the Civil Rights era. I even met Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as a 16-year-old, but Quock Walker was no one to me. I should have known about this person who helped render slavery unconstitutional here in my state. Our representatives up on Beacon Hill are moving H.3117 forward. Soon it will be voted on by the Senate and sent to the governor’s desk for a signature. Knowing more about how slavery was abolished in Massachusetts can only enrich all of us. The more we know, the better we are as America’s history moves on with or without our participation.
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