With coronavirus closing schools, here’s how you can help food insecure children

On any given day, the National School Lunch Program provides low-cost or free lunches to 29.7 million children. But the coronavirus pandemic is shutting down schools and parents are scrambling to find ways to feed their hungry kids.

Charitable organizations are working to fill the gap, but they need your help. Here are a few organizations you can support:

• Feeding America, with a network of 200 food banks across the U.S., has a COVID-19 Response Fund to help food banks support communities impacted by the pandemic.
• Save the Children has teamed up with actresses Jennifer Garner and Amy Adams to launch #SAVEWITHSTORIES. The program is providing children in America's poorest communities with nutritious meals, books and other learning resources during the outbreak closures.
• Blessings in a Backpack typically feeds school children across the U.S. through the weekend, but the organization is partnering with districts that have summer feeding programs to extend services while schools are shut down.
• United Way is using their COVID-19 Community Response and Recovery Fund to stock food banks with essential staples to help feed children who rely on schools for meals.
• World Central Kitchen founder Chef José Andrés closed all of his Washington D.C. area restaurants but keeping some of them open as community kitchens offering free to-go lunches for those in need.