Twice a month, as many as 80 families visit their school’s Healthy Student Market, staffed by Cicero West and East schools and stocked with food from the Greater Chicago Food Depository.

The need was already great among families in Cicero School District 99, even before the pandemic cost so many people their jobs. So, in addition to the Healthy Student Market, district staff organized regular breakfast and lunch pickups at 16 school sites, a bi-monthly mobile food pantry and benefits outreach to connect parents to other social services.

Principal Jill Miller, who helps oversee the Cicero West/East Healthy Student Market, heard of the great need from her own students, who shared, “We have nothing in the cabinet.” Miller says people in the community are “counting on this food.”

Your generous support of the Food Depository helps make Cicero’s program, and other vital school food programs, possible. Thank you for any gift you can make today!