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Upper Valley MEND Summer Associate Harvest VISTA

The Upper Valley MEND (Meeting Each Need with Dignity) gleaning program harvests excess or unmarketable fruits and vegetables from farms, orchards, backyard gardens, and farmers markets throughout the Wenatchee Valley and Chelan County. This produce is distributed to 13 food pantries in Chelan and Douglas counties, given out through mobile farmers markets, delivered to schools and senior living facilities, and added to meals at homeless shelters. An army of volunteers deploys to harvest this produce that would otherwise go to waste, gathering approximately 45,000 pounds of food annually from 50 local growers. During the busiest part of the season, the gleaning team could be harvesting 8-10 times a week. The amount of produce saved frequently tops $80,000. The gleaning program helps to address the challenge of getting fresh, healthy produce into the hands of people in high need, rural and underserved communities. This program ensures hungry families have access to high quality food throughout the summer and is extremely popular with all of the people served through the programs we partner with. The Upper Valley MEND gleaning program also supports local farmers through a grant called Farm to Food Pantry, which allows food pantries to purchase fresh produce directly from local farms. This allows us to have a wider variety of produce than what might be available to be gleaned. This AmeriCorps opportunity is a project of Harvest Against Hunger, which connects local growers, food banks, and volunteers to secure fresh produce for distribution to thousands of people throughout Washington State. The Harvest VISTA program finds innovative ways to decrease waste of fresh fruits and vegetables and increase the availability of nutritious produce for food bank clients. The VISTA Summer Associate (SA) program will work in an intensive level of summer service for 10 weeks.

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Please note:

This listing is currently not accepting applications.

Member Duties : The Summer Associate will work specifically with Upper Valley MEND’s gleaning program. They will work with the Gleaning Coordinator and Food Programs Manager to support and strengthen the gleaning program and develop relationships to distribute produce more effectively to food pantries and summer feeding programs. They will help organize volunteers to harvest, communicate with growers, and help distribute the gleaned produce to all the organizations we partner with. Social media is a growth area of this program, so the AmeriCorps member will work alongside the Gleaning Coordinator to improve our presence on and use of this communication tool.

Program Benefits : Living Allowance , Choice of Education Award or End of Service Stipend .


*For details about AmeriCorps VISTA healthcare benefits, please visit https://americorps.gov/members-volunteers/vista/benefits.

Terms : Car recommended .

Service Areas : Hunger , Community Outreach , Health , Environment , Education .

Skills : Community Organization , Communications , Public Speaking , Recruitment , Team Work , General Skills .



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SUMMARY
Program Type:
AmeriCorps VISTA

Program
Upper Valley MEND Summer Associate Harvest VISTA

Program Start/End Date
06/25/2023 - 09/02/2023

Work Schedule	Full Time

Age Requirement
Minimum: 18 Maximum: None

Program Locations	WASHINGTON

Accepting Applications
From 05/03/2023 To 06/07/2023

Contact	Maria Mendez-Francisco
1201 1st Ave S
Seattle WA 98134
206-236-0408
maria@harvestagainsthunger.org
harvestagainsthunger.org

Listing ID	102890


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