Baylor’s Texas Hunger Initiative making strides in reducing hunger across Texas

Despite some tremendous results in helping reduce hunger across the state, Baylor University’s Texas Hunger Initiative (THI) has flown somewhat under the radar since its founding in 2009. But no longer.

A series of sponsorships and grants from corporate foundations like Walmart and ConAgra Foods, coupled with contracts like this $3.5 million deal with the State of Texas, are allowing THI to rapidly expand the efforts that have already seen, for example, an additional 15 million breakfasts served to school children statewide over the past year.

In 2009, Baylor alum Jeremy Everett, MDiv ’01, began the Texas Hunger Initiative in a parking garage office space, working collaboratively with Baylor’s School of Social Work, the Baptist General Convention of Texas and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. His goal was to develop a model to significantly reduce (and perhaps eliminate) hunger by building a public-private infrastructure that could be replicated in other states. To accomplish such a feat, THI has worked with local volunteers in cities across Texas to make sure money already budgeted for food program assistance is better and more efficiently utilized.

[Learn more about the Texas Hunger Initiative and how it works in this excellent feature from the latest issue of Baylor Magazine.]

Thanks to increased funding from outside sources, THI is now able to expand, opening a dozen regional offices (from El Paso to Houston and Amarillo to McAllen) to better coordinate with individuals in the communities being served. (Want to join in? Learn more here.)

Baylor’s Pro Futuris strategic vision calls for Baylor to be a place “where our Christian faith, in conjunction with our expertise and resources, inspires a desire to address systematic problems facing our community.” THI is a perfect example of how Baylor can serve not only our students, but our entire state. Pro Texana, indeed.

Sic ’em, Texas Hunger Initiative!