Students Fight to End World Hunger, One Grilled Cheese At a Time

An innovative, non-profit food service business working towards a world free from suffering, hunger and gender discrimination by raising money for The Hunger Project

Lydia Morin

Issue date: 1/24/06 Section: News

Media Credit: Ike Messmore

Members of UVM FeelGood stand in front of their self-built kiosk, becoming the first organizaton of their type to have two in the nation. From left: Sarah Johnson, Chris Dunham, Leah Eide, Steve Balduino, Taryn Ross.

As Felix Adler proclaimed, "to care for anyone else enough to make their problems one's own, is ever the beginning of one's real ethical development." The leaders of UVM Feel Good, Seniors, President Steven Balduino, Vice President Chris Dunham, Fundraising Chair Sarah Johnson and Juniors Treasurer Taryn Ross and Deli Manager Leah Eide, take Adler's words to heart and are taking on the hunger problems of the world, with the goal of "ending world hunger, one grilled cheese at a time."

You may remember these philanthropists from their UVM debut at Spring Fest 2005, when they were peddling grilled cheese outside of the gym. For a small donation to the Hunger Project you got a delicious gourmet grilled cheese with pretty much whatever you could possibly desire grilled with it. All profits are donated to the Hunger Project, making the situation ideal for the consumer.

The Hunger Project is, as described on the Feel Good website, "a strategic organization and global movement committed to the sustainable end of world hunger." Their highest priority is to empower women because they feel that "woman bear the primary responsibility for family health, education and nutrition - yet by tradition, culture and law they are denied the means, information and freedom of action to fulfill this responsibility.

Feel Good began at the University of Texas with a "bunch of passionate cross country runners and friends who had decided it was time to stop fooling around."

A founder recalled, "The statisticians that we were, we realized that given our college education, cars, computers, access to the Internet, and daily servings of Raman noodles, we were better off than 99.95% of the world! Feeling guilty wasn't going to feed any mouths. But becoming active in showing appreciation would."

Needless to say, a small stand with a George Foreman grill at the University of Texas-Austin has grown in a nationwide effort, with affiliates at not only the University of Vermont but also Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania.

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