Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Local boy starts effort to help the less fortunate
A student at Marsh Creek Sixth Grade Center, Nate Hyson, is just a little bit different.
Not too many 12-year-old children will hand you their business card.
A student at Marsh Creek Sixth Grade Center, Nate Hyson, is just a little bit different.
The young philanthropist collects monetary contributions and then donates baby food.
The donations started rolling in when Nate was six years old. He built a collection box and gathered $29 from neighbors and visitors to his Coatesville home, where he lives with his mother Sarah, father Chris and brother Elliot. A note on the original box read, “Donations for People Who Need
Food.”
Nate said he can’t feed everybody.
“So I choose to feed babies because they are too little to feed themselves,” Nate said. “It gives me a sense of satisfaction and it makes me feel good because I’m helping other people.
“I really like babies and want to give them a good start in life.”
After an initial food donation to the Coatesville YWCA Gateway Shelter, Nate and his family have donated 3,000 pounds of baby food to the Chester County Food Bank.
Father Chris said that Nate tries to donate once per month and some months drops off 100 pounds of baby food at the food bank.
Nate hopes to one day feed the whole country and world and to eradicate infant hunger.
Along with his mother, Sarah, president and board of director of “Baby Food Fund,” Nate helped establish a 501 (c) 3 charity.
Nate has run fundraisers and collected at “Time to Leap Dance Studio” where his brother Elliot takes classes, at West Bradford Elementary School, at the Unitarian Congregation of West Chester, and collected at Wayback Burgers and Iron Hill Brewery. He buys the food mostly at Target.
Sarah Hyson emailed the following information on the food drives: “When Nate was in fourth grade, he received a grant from Sodexo and Youth Service America to improve his yearly food drive. As part of this, he taught his class about food insecurity in Chester County, the wealthiest county in Pennsylvania. Unfortunately, there are no available statistics on how many infants live in food insecure households.
“In order to get an estimate, Nate and I used the statistics on how many births there are in Chester County every year (5322 babies in 2016) and the percentage of children living in food insecure households (12.4%) to determine that roughly 660 babies are born every year into food insecure households.
“From there, we looked at how much baby food an infant needs each day (also an estimate since it varies depending on age and growth patterns) and the general cost of baby food to determine that it would
take over 120,000 pounds of baby food every year to end infant food insecurity in Chester County.
“Baby Food Fund has made a significant impact, but we have a long way to go!”
Nate has received commendations and letters from several public officials, including State Sen. Andy Dinniman, D-19, West Whiteland, former state Rep. Eric Roe, R-158, Marshallton and former first lady Michelle Obama.
He talked about the Obama correspondence.
“I feel very proud,” Nate said. “I got something from a very important person.”
At age 12, Nate is already a very important person, too. He’s an inspiration and makes us want to do more to help out on this wildly spinning, hungry planet. Thank you Nate! Go to Nate Hyson’s website at www.babyfoodfund.org