Topaz Page-Green and the Lunchbox Fund

In 2004 the Lunchbox Fund was created by model Topaz Page-Green as a simple intervention to provide free and healthy lunches to high school students.

Posted in: Charity

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Squatter Camp: Much of the living conditions in the townships, especially Alexandra, resemble this: overcrowding, lack of sanitation, four or more families to one tap for all water requirements, no electricity.

Daily Deliveries: Tlake Maponyane owns a local community bakery in the Soweto township and supplies our Soweto schools with their daily bread and fresh fruit for the feeding program. Here he makes a delivery to Reasoma High School.

Interview and Accountability: Here I'm interviewing a teacher at Beyers Naude High about crime, poverty, and hunger in the community. She describes high levels of parental unemployment and the children at the school who are AIDS orphans depending on their grandparents pension—which is not enough to feed a family.

The teacher goes on to talk about how the children come to school on empty stomachs and go home with empty stomachs, and also describes how impoverished students are identified.

Students at Meadowlands High: Here are kids at one of the schools—they are always very happy and friendly. They carry their poverty with dignity.

Feeding Line: A student comes off the feeding line with peanut butter sandwiches and fruit.

Sass: They always make me laugh. Whenever I bring out the camera, they all scramble to get in the shot. They've got a lot of sass—I love that.

Gratitude: Whenever I go to the schools to take pictures and document the program's progress, I am constantly approached by these young students. They express so much gratitude—they are always in awe that there are people who care about them. They always ask me to please say thank you to the people in America who care enough to make sure that they have something to eat at school.

Inspiration: These children were the group that inspired me to start the organization. They are the primary school children who are provided a meal at school by the government due to poverty and the "at-risk" status of their schools. I met them and was irrevocably touched. These same children will no longer receive a meal at school as soon as they enter seventh grade...