In front of her home on Jo Johnston Avenue, Samaria Leach is setting out a stack of chapter books. “Especially during the summer, I like to make sure the kids have something to read when they come to get their food,” she explains. “They seem to really like it.”
Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, Samaria serves lunch to the J. Henry Hale neighborhood out of her front window. It began during the COVID-19 pandemic when schools shut down, leaving children who relied on schools’ daily breakfasts and lunches without food. As 2020 trudged on, Samaria continued to spread much-needed joy and food throughout her community, becoming known throughout her neighborhood as Window of Love.
Eventually, schools resumed for the fall semester, as did regular school meals for the kids who had become frequent visitors to the Window. But the question stuck with Samaria: where were these kids normally getting food during the summer months, or even spring break? She knew that Window of Love needed to stretch beyond those lonely pandemic months.
“God placed on my heart to continue and continue, so that’s what I did: continue and continue and continue.” —Samaria Leach, Window of Love
With support from her neighbors and a network across the city, Samaria was able to continue, opening the Window three days a week during the summer and other school breaks. Now, she shares food with between 50 and 75 kids each week during the summer months, in addition to educational resources and even the occasional field trip!
The gap that Window of Love fills is one that affects thousands of children every summer: local school systems provide a reliable source of nutrition for families that are impacted by food insecurity. In fact, every school year, Metro Nashville Public Schools serves around 4 million breakfasts and 8.4 million lunches. But during the summer months, without these daily meals, many youth are at risk of hunger. The Nashville Food Project is proud to work alongside partners like Window of Love through our summer children’s meals program, Sweet Peas, sponsored by Jackson National Life Insurance Company (Jackson®) for the fifth year in a row. This summer alone, the program distributed nearly 11,500 meals to kids across Nashville.
Through Sweet Peas, The Nashville Food Project was able to help Window of Love scale up their efforts to build community and alleviate hunger this summer by supplementing the snacks Samaria was already making with 90 additional nutritious snacks full of hard-to-come-by fruits and veggies each week. The partnership made it possible for kids in Samaria’s North Nashville neighborhood to try new foods, too.
“One day we had salads,” explains Samaria, “and one of the little boys was like, ‘I don’t eat salads!’ I said, ‘what if I add something special?’ So I put some turkey on there for him, added a little cheese, and he asked for a salad again the next day. It’s life-changing for the kids.”
It takes a lot of collaboration to get salads like this one in front of — and in the bellies of! — these kids. And Window of Love isn’t the only place it’s happening. In addition to Window of Love, funding from Jackson® made it possible for us to share meals with children at 18 other sites this summer.
“It takes a community,” says Samaria. “It’s not just about me. The Window is about everybody — communities working together — because our goal is the same thing: to make sure no child is going hungry.”
