Orphanage Club Fights Against Global Hunger

By Cedric L. ‘24, Tia A. ‘24, and Ava F. ‘26
Orphanage Club Hunger Day Chairpersons 22-23

The Orphanage Club is now the longest-running student-led service club, lasting for over 52 years. One of the many club initiatives is Hunger Week and Hunger Day, a biannual event dedicated to raising hunger awareness throughout the school. This year, over the course of Hunger Week, upper school students taught Hunger Lessons to lower and middle school students  in order to help raise awareness about food waste, privilege, and encourage students to be grateful for what they have.

On Hunger Day, November 15, donation booths were set up all around the school. Thanks to the generosity of our TAS community, these donation booths helped raise money that will be donated to Oxfam America, American Friends Service Committee, and World Vision Taiwan - organizations that fight world hunger and poverty.

Hunger is a prevalent problem in many places around the world, not just in third-world countries. In fact, 1 in 5 American children do not have access to enough food. There is more than enough food in this world to feed our ever-growing population, however, roughly 880 million people are not even guaranteed one meal every day. This means that around 1 out of 9 people suffer from food insecurity, or a lack of food due to financial reasons. World hunger is a serious and complex economic issue, but it is important to understand that poverty is one of the principal causes of food insecurity. The unequal distribution of wealth, armed conflicts, refugee crises, and geographical resources cause millions to go hungry each day, yet many still do not grasp how urgent of a problem global hunger is. 

Many people in our TAS community dump unfinished lunches into the food waste bin without batting an eye. TAS wastes around 15 tons of food each year, equivalent to the weight of one fully loaded school bus. Many people in this world are not as fortunate as us to be food secure; most of us have always had food to eat when we wanted it. This is one of the reasons why the Orphanage Club is committed to raising awareness throughout our community about the critical problem of food waste helping those who are less fortunate than we are. We should recognize our privilege and be mindful of other people’s situations.

Our next Hunger Week will take place in the spring from Monday, March 13 to Friday, March 17. On Tuesday, March 14 - Hunger Day - Orphanage Club will be set up all-day donation booths around campus. We encourage you to consider contributing to our donation booth outside the lobby on Hunger Day to help those who are less fortunate than us.