SIFE Receives Grant

The University of Findlay’s Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) group was one of approximately 90 teams across the nation selected to receive a $500 grant from Campbell Soup Co. as part of the company’s “Let’s Can Hunger” challenge. The challenge aims to raise hunger awareness, provide urgent hunger relief and empower those in need to defeat the cycle of long-term hunger.

According to adviser Gregory Arburn, Ph.D., assistant professor of economics and finance, SIFE uses an entrepreneurial approach of business and economic concepts to empower people in need and to improve their standard of living.

To achieve this, the team used the grant to fund several different projects in late November. SIFE members partnered with Helping Hands, Sodexo and other UF service organizations to collect food to donate to Chopin Hall. The students volunteered at Chopin Hall to repackage the donated food for distribution.

The students also volunteered to buy, cook and serve a dinner for approximately 40 people at the Findlay City Mission and to adopt a family for Christmas through the Salvation Army. The adopted family received presents and Christmas dinner, funded by the grant.

“The service projects at Chopin Hall and the Findlay City Mission helped me realize just how many people in our community are in need,” says SIFE project leader Trisha Denniston, a junior human resource management and business management major. “I often see TV commercials publicizing the vast number of hungry people in other countries but I’ve never seen a commercial addressing the hungry in my own community.”

The University of Findlay SIFE group hopes its efforts will qualify it to be one of 45 teams to receive an additional award (up to $1,000) this May so that it can continue to fight hunger and raise awareness in Hancock County.

“What we did wasn’t that difficult,” says Denniston. “If people would just take a little time to recognize and reach out to those in need, hunger might cease to be an issue.”

By Katie Baumgart