Katie discovered her amazing green thumb could help feed the hungry!
Katie Stagliano was in elementary school when she discovered she had an amazing gift for growing vegetables—enough to feed hundreds of hungry people!
Nine-year-old Katie Stagliano wandered into her small backyard garden to check on the cabbage she’d been growing. Ever since her teacher had given her a seedling as part of a gardening program for children, tending to the plant had become part of Katie’s after-school routine.
The third-grader had given her cabbage plenty of Tlc—watering it, fertilizing it, weeding it, even building a small fence to keep out the deer that wandered into her family’s Summerville, South Carolina, yard. Now, the cabbage had grown to be an incredible 40 pounds!
Astonished and proud, Katie wondered: What can we do with a cabbage this big?
Just then, something her dad often said at dinner popped into her mind. “Remember how lucky we are for this food.” And in that moment, Katie had an idea: What if we use this cabbage to help feed people in need?
Growing a dream
Katie had never been to a soup kitchen before. As she walked up to the small building with her family, she saw a line of nearly a hundred people stretching out the door, waiting for what might have been their only meal of the day.
“There were families just like mine, but who had fallen on hard times,” Katie recalls.
When people saw Katie’s cabbage, they were amazed. “Is that for us?” one woman asked. Katie nodded. “Wow! Thank you!” the woman marveled, wrapping her arms around Katie.
And when volunteers saw Katie’s prized cabbage, they invited her back to see how it could be transformed into a hearty soup with ham and rice— enough to feed 275 people! That day changed Katie’s life. “This is what I want to do,” she told her mom, explaining that she wanted to grow produce for the soup kitchen. “If one cabbage could do so much, imagine what we could do with an entire garden!”
With her parents’ help, Katie started a garden at home. Then she approached her school’s principal, and when he heard her idea he set aside a plot of land the size of a football field to plant and grow there, too!
Every day after school, Katie and her mom would tend to the garden. And as word spread, students and faculty began pitching in, watering the plants. Seasoned gardeners helped Katie pick the best varieties of herbs and vegetables. Neighbors donated money for seeds and plants. A farmer even offered the use of his tractor to till the land!
Soon, Katie was donating hundreds of pounds of vegetables to her community. And she longed to do even more. So with her parents’ help, she founded Katie’s Krops (Katieskrops.com), a nonprofit offering funding and support for kids to start vegetable gardens of their own for charity.
Filling bellies— and hearts!
For Eloise Mackey, a mom of five living in a homeless shelter, Katie’s Krops was a godsend. “Katie is a magnificent young woman. She came into my family’s life when we were in a difficult spot, giving us the healthy food my children needed,” Eloise recalls.
When one elderly couple gained custody of their two great-grandchildren, they had trouble feeding two more mouths on their fixed budget. So Katie stepped in to make sure their bellies were always full. And when they did get back on their feet and moved into their own home, Katie helped them plant their own vegetable garden filled with tomatoes, peppers and lettuce!
Another day, while Katie was giving a speech at a school about ending hunger, she asked the audience if they had any questions.
One little girl, about nine years old, raised her hand and said, “I don’t have a question. I just wanted to say that you’re very nice.” With that, she placed a heart-shaped sticker on Katie’s shirt and wrapped her arms around her in a hug.
“Thank you,” Katie smiled, blinking back tears— only to find out later that the girl’s family had received produce from Katie’s Krops that allowed them to put food on the table.
Shauna Sethman’s budget was stretched thin when she took in her grandson, Jason.
“But with Katie’s help, we’ve gotten enough fresh vegetables to cook the nutritious meals Jason needs,” Shauna says. “It’s amazing how a girl who started off with one little seed has become such a blessing to so many people!”
Today, Katie’s Krops has 100 youth-run vegetable gardens across 32 states. Last year, they collectively gave more than 26,000 pounds of produce to those in need!
Not only are kids supporting soup kitchens with vegetables like lettuce, cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower, but they also donate produce to homeless shelters, community centers, senior citizens, veterans and the unemployed.
And Katie, now 18, is as committed as ever to putting a dent in the country’s hunger problem.
“You never know what someone is going through,” Katie says. “I feel like I was given a green thumb and put on this path for a reason. And there’s no greater feeling in the world than knowing you’ve helped someone!”