Add Passion And Stir

As the daughter of a teacher, a teacher herself, and the former Chancellor of DC Public Schools, Kaya Henderson believes in the power of education. In this conversation, part of Add Passion and Stir’s ongoing Rebuilding Series, Henderson recounts how she grew up in a household with an ethic of “to whom much is given much is required” and how that instilled a desire to give back. An opportunity to teach in the South Bronx as a member of Teach for America sparked Henderson’s love of education: “I taught middle school Spanish in the South Bronx for two years. It completely changed my life, changed my outlook, changed my trajectory.” Her experience in education led her to realize that formal education systems don’t offer enough opportunities to develop children’s cultural identity and specifically offer space to discuss Black contributions in an accurate, identity-affirming way. This led her to found Reconstruction, an online education platform that “teaches Black Glory, Black Love, Black Genius, Black Kindness,

Sharif El-Mekki is the founder and CEO of the Center for Black Educator Development, which is focused on revolutionizing education by dramatically increasing the number of Black educators. “People are naive enough to think that once you enter a school, racial bias disappears,” says El-Mekki. “If a Black child has a Black teacher, they have a higher sense of belonging, they’re less likely to be suspended or expelled. They have more access to rigorous courses, higher attendance, better grades.” El-Mekki sees the work as a form of activism. “Educational justice and racial justice are connected and cannot be separated,” he stresses. Join us to learn more about a truly different approach to equity in the classroom and beyond.This episode is part of Add Passion and Stir’s ongoing series Rebuilding which connects with leaders from across media, restaurants, education, government, and beyond to learn they’re reimagining and redesigning their industries to make sure everyone feels a sense of belonging.See Privacy Poli

Cities are on the frontlines of responding to the short and long-term impacts of hunger in their communities and mayors have witnessed firsthand the hardship their constituents face. On this episode of Add Passion and Stir, we speak with two mayors leading the fight against child hunger. Mayor Levar Stoney of Richmond, Virginia and Mayor John Giles of Mesa, Arizona are the inaugural Chair and Vice Chair of the new Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger. The Alliance is a nonpartisan coalition of more than 50 mayors working in partnership with Share Our Strength's No Kid Hungry campaign to end childhood hunger.Members of the Alliance will engage in collective advocacy to address child hunger at state and federal levels. Mayors Stoney and Giles have a lot of hope about what this group can do to transcend partisan politics. “I think sometimes people try to define an issue like childhood hunger as a political issue between Democrats and Republicans. When you're in this role as mayor, you find out that this is ab

With just over 580,000 residents, Wyoming is a state where “when you meet someone, it really is about one or two degrees of separation before you are starting to find common friends,” says First Lady of Wyoming, Jennie Gordon. That connectedness makes the knowledge that 1 in 5 children in Wyoming suffer from food insecurity even more personal to the First Lady and the people of Wyoming. As First Lady, Gordon has made food insecurity a core initiative and launched the Wyoming Hunger Initiative in 2019. The initiative is working with existing organizations in the state to end childhood hunger and food insecurity in Wyoming: “Almost every community had a food pantry…but what they needed was awareness. I wanted to work on raising awareness and finding a Wyoming solution to the [food insecurity] challenges we face in the state,” says Gordon. In this episode of Add Passion and Stir, Gordon shares how her parents' experience with food insecurity – her mother grew up in Vienna, Austria during WWII and her father grew

In this episode of Add Passion and Stir from early 2019, Thrive Global Founder and CEO Arianna Huffington and renowned pastry chef and North Fork Table and Inn owner Claudia Fleming discuss a topic very relevant today: the effects of stress and exhaustion on creativity, productivity and health. “For all of us, what moves the needle, whether it’s in a non-profit or for-profit business, are creative ideas. They are the first to be sacrificed when we are exhausted… If your life is just about productivity and there is no joy, there is something wrong,” explains Huffington. Fleming uses her influence as a chef to effect change. “Food is politics. You can’t get away from the fact that agribusiness runs a good portion of our government. I think there’s no greater way to effect change than by bringing people together. As chefs, we do that,” she explains.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this conversation from October, 2020, James Beard award-winning Minneapolis chef Ann Kim discusses her immigrant experience, approach to food, and observations about her community in the wake of the George Floyd murder. “It is our job to make changes, educate and learn. We can’t make decisions rooted in fear,” she says. “People scream when they feel like they’re not being heard. I was trying to listen and I wasn’t quite sure how I was to react, except that I wanted to support the black community,” explains Kim. Kim talks about her support of the SNAP (food stamps) expansion, drawing on her own family’s experience with government assistance programs. “Keeping kids fed… If we can’t do that, what can we do?,” she says. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Rachel Sumekh, Founder & CEO of Swipe Out Hunger, discusses hunger on Swipe Out Hunger campuses and the value of activism. “One in three college students in the US today is food insecure. We pitch education and we pitch going to college as a pathway to get out of poverty, and yet our students get there and we cannot deliver on that promise,” says Sumekh. Swipe Out Hunger is the leading nonprofit addressing hunger among college students with a range of anti-hunger programs in more than 140 colleges. Their flagship program, ‘The Swipe Drive,’ enables students to donate meals to their peers facing food insecurity on campus. “How we define the work really matters… If we see our work as a greater vision of building a world where everyone who wants to get an education has food in their stomachs and has an educational experience that makes them feel welcome and whole and complete… we build a different world.” Sumekh, who founded the organization with her friends as a college student, encourages listeners to get

As we continue to deal with the coronavirus pandemic, No Kid Hungry is telling the stories of what children faced during the crisis - and the incredible people working to feed them. Working with local artists in cities across the country, NKH’s Rebuilding campaign created a series of five micro-documentaries and murals in Atlanta, Los Angeles, Detroit, New York, and Washington, D.C. to showcase the stories of local children’s thoughts and feelings about life during the pandemic and their hopes for the future into public works of art.In this episode of “Add Passion and Stir,” host Billy Shore and Share Our Strength’s CMO, Pamela Taylor connect with Désirée Kelly, the artist that created the Rebuilding mural featured in Detroit, MI. Kelly, a Detroit-native known for her distinctive style of storytelling through portraits with a mixture of “street art” & traditional oil technique, describes the experience of sharing her community's story: “It meant so much to me being a Detroiter and representing the communi

Interior designer and philanthropist Charlotte Moss and Ford Foundation President Darren Walker discuss the importance of ending child hunger. Moss selected No Kid Hungry to be the beneficiary of her latest project, Home: A Celebration . Home is an ode to Edith Wharton’s The Book of the Homeless, which was a 1916 fundraiser to help refugees and children during WWI. Home features 120 artists, poets, chefs, designers, photographers, and writers offering personal reflections on the essence of home. Contributors include Drew Barrymore, Candice Bergen, Tory Burch, Seth Godin, Renee and John Grisham, Bianca Jagger, Annie Leibovitz, Jon Meacham, Bette Midler, Joyce Carol Oates, Al Roker, Gloria Steinem, Darren Walker, and Fanny and Alice Waters. “This is really philanthropy at its best, when people come together to for single cause and give of themselves - in essence sharing their strength - is what you're all about and what this book is all about,” says Moss. Walker was compelled to write the book’s foreword. “It w

Reverend Jim Wallis, Chair in Faith and Justice at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy and Founder of Sojourners, reports on how dozens of faith organizations continue to advocate together for making the Child Tax Credit permanent, among other provisions in the proposed Build Back Better legislation. “We came together across many of our theological and political boundaries in the faith community to support the Child Tax Credit and the other critical factors in this human infrastructure bill.” Wallis and his fellow faith leaders are fighting for the most vulnerable Americans. “Unfortunately, it continues to be true that when the government wants to tighten its belt, it tightens the belt around the necks of the poor. And when they want to be fiscally responsible, they do it on the backs of the lowest income families and children. And that’s just not wrong. That's sinful… The Bible says that kings and rulers - those who rule - will be defined and will be judged by how they treat the poor and

For nearly 25 years, the Child Tax Credit has helped eligible American families with the cost of raising children. In 2021, the American Rescue Plan included significant changes to the credit: the amount per child was increased, 26 million more children were made eligible for the benefit, and the credit became a monthly cash payment as opposed to an annual lump sum. The impact of these changes are profound with experts saying that childhood poverty could be cut in half. In this final episode of Add Passion and Stir’s Child Tax Credit series, we explore the impact the credit is having on families and it's role in reducing child poverty in America. Share Our Strength’s Billy Shore speaks with Kim Ford, CEO of Washington, DC-based Martha’s Table and Cailyn Thomas, Family Engagement Specialist at Martha’s Table. For Kim, the power of the credit’s direct monthly cash payments: “It’s very different when you respect someone to the point where you say, ‘this is your money and you make your own decision with it.’” We

Child Tax Credit Series Bonus ContentCongresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut) has long been a champion in fighting child poverty. As part of our series on the Child Tax Credit, we spoke with DeLauro about the difference the Credit is making in the lives of families.Now Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, DeLauro has been a proponent of the Child Tax Credit since 2003. “[The Child Tax Credit] is the most transformative piece of social legislation that we have seen in decades in this country.” She is currently very focused on Congressional negotiations around making the new expansion permanent. “When you don't capture these moments, you lose them for the next 20 or 30 years.”In this full interview with DeLauro, we hear her staunch commitment to helping children and families. “We have a moral obligation and moral responsibility to do that, and it's a place where government can make a difference,” she concludes.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art

In this second episode of Add Passion and Stir’s Child Tax Credit series, we look at how organizations are using technology to make sure eligible families are receiving the credit. With more than 36 million additional children — a majority of whom are Black and Latino — now eligible and the credit being distributed as a monthly payment instead of an annual lump sum many changes were required to ensure success of the program.We spoke with Amanda Renteria, CEO of Code for America, who launched the GetCTC.org portal to make it easier for families to claim their credit and Jimmy Chen, CEO of Propel, the organization behind the Providers app, which allows participants to manage a variety of government benefits, including the CTC, in one place about how they are helping to the credit reach all eligible families.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Child Tax Credit Series Bonus ContentCongressman Jim McGovern (D-Massachusetts) has made it his mission to end childhood hunger. As part of Add Passion and Stir's series covering the expansions to the Child Tax Credit, we spoke with McGovern about his advocacy for legislation that addresses the root causes of hunger and poverty in America. Elected in 1996, the year the Child Tax Credit was created, McGovern has seen all variations of the credit from inside Congress. For him, the expansion of the Child Tax Credit to provide benefits to an additional 39 million households is a critical component of a cross-governmental strategy to end poverty.McGovern says, “This [bill] is about our values. These are people’s lives…The reason why this investment is so significant is because we have underinvested in people for decades.” In this full interview with McGovern, we hear how he is working with leaders in and out of government to finally make the conversation about hunger something that we address head on. “Hunger is a

Passed in 1997, The Child Tax Credit, known as the CTC, provides an end of year tax credit to families with children under 16. In March 2021, as part of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus aid package, the American Rescue Plan, the credit was made available to children 17 and under for the first time, the amount of the credit was increased from $2,000 to $3,000 for children 6-17 and from $2,000 to $3,600 for children under six, and it was changed to a monthly payment instead of annual lump sum. Experts estimate these changes could lift as many as five million kids out of poverty.In this first episode of a series on the Child Tax Credit, Add Passion and Stir welcomes Congressman Jim McGovern (D-MA), Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT), Senator Michael Bennet (D-CO), and other thought leaders for a conversation about the origin and evolution of this legislation. What was the original concept? How has it worked and not worked? How did the CTC’s expansion come to pass? And how are broader policy changes, such as an histo

The restaurant industry was hit incredibly hard by the pandemic. In 2020, Add Passion and Stir connected with chefs to learn how the pandemic was affecting them. We're revisiting these inspiring conversations to showcase the resilience of the restaurant industry and its commitment to service.We spoke with Chicago’s award-winning chef and Mexico: One Plate at a Time host Rick Bayless in September of 2020. At that time he was concerned about independent restaurants and advocating for federal funds to stabilize them. “If we don’t get some assistance, I’m afraid we’re going to see our neighborhoods just devastated. They are going to lose their character. Restaurants are a major part of our culture,” he explained. Bayless got involved with the Independent Restaurant Coalition, which lobbied Congress for funds to support the restaurant industry. In early 2021, the Biden Administration’s American Rescue Plan Act established the Restaurant Revitalization Fund which provides funding to help restaurants and other eligi

Television writer, producer and former teen idol Shaun Cassidy talks about telling his story and his My First Crush wines. Cassidy is touring again for the first time in decades, writing and producing NBC’s “New Amsterdam,” and selling wine to support No Kid Hungry. “’Find your story’ is the theme of my show… when we're born, there's often a story that society or family or our own crazy expectations have written for us, but it's not always the story we're meant to experience… we have to find our own story and the satisfaction in doing that is profound,” says Cassidy about his music tour. “The more personal, the more open you are, the more vulnerable you are to the audience, the more relatable you are.” He also continues to be excited about helping to end child hunger through his wine making. “Yes, it's a charitable endeavor, but it's also an extraordinary wine and I'm really proud of that… and the fact that it means kids are going to be less hungry than they were the day before t

Award-winning Chez Panisse chef and cookbook author Alice Waters discusses the value of real, regenerative food for our children and our society as a whole. “Once you love nature, you can't make the wrong decision about anything. You don't want to do things that are really destroying the planet. You want to take care of her. Until we feel that way, we will never be able to make the right decisions,” she says. Waters founded Edible Schoolyard, an experiential learning program at a Berkeley middle school that deepens students’ relationship with food, gardening and cooking skills, and capacity for critical examination of the food system, more than 25 years ago. “The kitchen classroom became a place to teach world history. It's a way to reach a person through all their senses and those are pathways into our minds,” states Waters. “We decided to put our money behind our values to educate the next generation to change the world. I so believe that education is the deep place where we can make systemic change.”See Pr

Award-winning Washington DC chef Kwame Onwuachi (formerly of Kith/Kin) and Salamander Hotels & Resorts Founder & CEO and BET co-founder Sheila Johnson discuss The Family Reunion (LINK) , black culture, and diversity in the hospitality industry. The Family Reunion was an immersive experience presented by Onwuachi in partnership with Food&Wine and Salamander Hotels & Resorts on August 19-22, 2021 where dozens of chefs, culinary and hospitality professionals and a few hundred attendees celebrated diversity in the hospitality community. “I've been a part of so many food festivals… and I was wondering why there wasn't anything that really just celebrated black contributions to the food industry. We need to have an event that celebrates black and brown contributions to the food industry on a black owned property with a historical context,” says Onwuachi. Johnson is pushing the hospitality industry on diversity and equity. “We're going to grow it, and we will continually shine light on the issues unt

The restaurant industry was hit incredibly hard by the pandemic. In 2020, Add Passion and Stir connected with chefs to learn how the pandemic was affecting them. We're revisiting these inspiring conversations to showcase the resilience of the restaurant industry and its commitment to service.When we spoke with Amanda Cohen of NYC’s Dirt Candy in April 2020, the shutdown in New York City was only weeks old. Cohen said she and other chefs were struggling with reopening their restaurants after the crisis has passed. “How are we going to reopen? What am I reopening to? Who still has money to go out in this city? And who wants to go to a crowded restaurant?,” she asks. She has long been an outspoken advocate for fair restaurant industry practices. She is also a leader on eliminating tipping in her restaurant. Dirt Candy offers a starting hourly wage of $25/hour, as well as paid time off, paid sick leave, health insurance, and continuing education. “If we reopen the same way as we closed, we will have literally lea