It was during her first year of teaching that Jeanne Nusbaum became aware of children struggling from food insecurity in her community.

“At first all we could do was hand out crackers to hungry kids and give information about food stamps, but it wasn’t enough,” she said. “It is unconscionable that in our country of wealth and plenty, so many families go without.”

Jeanne and Eliot Nusbaum volunteer at Food Bank of Iowa every Tuesday. They help tackle a variety of tasks including working with one-time food donations, food rescue, ensuring our BackPack program is operating at full capacity, and a variety of other special projects. Over the past three and a half years they have built skill sets as volunteers that are invaluable to our organization.

“When I retired, Jeanne and I decided to volunteer at the Food Bank,” said Eliot. “We chose the Food Bank based on a simple premise: there’s no excuse for hunger in Iowa. Volunteering is what we can do to combat hunger.”

With the help of the Nusbaum’s and other key volunteers, Food Bank of Iowa has started assembling BackPack sacks on site to make sure more than 5,000 children across our service area are sent home with nutritious food to help them get by on the weekends. We could not have reinstated this in-house program without the help of this team.

“The Nusbaum’s are consistent and bring an efficiency to our team that can only come from a deep understanding of our mission and operations,” said Michaela Devaney, Food Bank of Iowa volunteer training and development manager. “I appreciate the passion and energy that they have brought to our organization and I feel really thankful that I have had the opportunity to work with them.”

Visit www.foodbankiowa.org/volunteer to learn how you can get involved.