Laura Toney

Lori Bedell
14 October 2013

No Kid Hungry: Share Our Strength

What is the cost of childhood hunger? 17.8 billion dollars: Value of charitable
contributions to address hunger and food insecurities. 19.2 billion dollars: Value of poor
educational outcomes and lower lifetime earnings linked to hunger and food insecurity. 130.5
billion dollars: Illness costs linked to hunger and food insecurity
Inspired by an Ethiopian famine in 1984, siblings Billy and Debbie Shore founded the
Share Our Strength organization with high hopes to help end global hunger and food insecurities.
In 2008, Share Our Strength adopted the tagline No Kid Hungry and is now known as No Kid
Hungry: Share Our Strength. Today, this organization has raised over 24.8 million dollars in
revenue through fundraising platforms. NoKidHungry.org is a website with an obvious goal:
end childhood hunger in America. The statement itself is simple, and the process can be simple
as well according to the website. How does one go about providing food for thousands of needy
children in the United States? NoKidHungry.org makes it clear that we (as Americans) can be a
part of the effort to end hunger together. The use of logos, problem vs. solution, and pathos
persuade No Kid Hungrys audience to be a part of their goal to end childhood hunger.
No Kid Hungry: Share Our Strength stands by the fact that childhood hunger is a
problem; but nevertheless, a problem that is solvable. This is a logical statement, and therefore,
No Kid Hungry utilizes logos in order to get the point across to their audience. The audience in
this situation are people, mostly adults in the United States, who are able to access the internet to
gain awareness about childhood hunger through NoKidHungry.org. After the target audience
becomes aware of the website, the exigence in this situation makes itself present. There are
children who are starving in America, and this is bad, to put it lightly. While navigating the
website, one will find an entire section titled, The Problem. Here, facts about childhood
hunger scroll across the screen. A specific fact that stands out on this page states that hunger
has a huge effect on how a child performs at school. Obviously, this is one of the primary
problems related to childhood hunger. Paired with this fact is a series of events that will follow
if a child does not have proper nutrition before school. A child who does not have a healthy
breakfast is more likely to get sick, which leads to more days of that child missing school, which
then leads to a lower chance of this child graduating from high school. And of course, if the
teenager who was once (and still may be) a hungry child does not graduate from high school, he
or she is less likely to find a good-paying job, and as a result this person less likely to be able to
feed his or her family, resulting in a never-ending cycle. A logical series of events such as this
one makes the problem obvious, but this does not mean that there is not a solution.
Paired with the section The Problem there also is a tab titled The Solution. So, faced
with such a troubling problem, we must have a solution, and NoKidHungry.org offers just that.
Upon re-directing to the solution tab, the audience sees that No Kid Hungry views the solution
as simple, and they explain it using 3 simple words: Access, education, and awareness.
Access describes how No Kid Hungry is connecting kids to effective nutrition programs, such as
school breakfasts. Through the second step, education, a branch program of No Kid Hungry
called Cooking Matters educates low-income families on how to stretch their budget to
provide healthy meals for their children when they are at home. Finally, being aware of
childhood hunger in itself is a step towards the solution. By making their audience aware that
childhood hunger is a problem, No Kid Hungry makes the audience a part of a solution, because
they are now aware that some type of action must be made in order for the solution to unfold.
As if these three steps werent enough, there is a bright orange button located near the face of a
wide-eyed, blonde girl on a scrolling banner that says, Donate today. Simple enough?
Finally, pathos plays a large role in the effectiveness of the website. At a first glance at
the website, one might not see anything that screams, sad or helpless children need your
support! This is because within the entire website, there are no saddening photos. What is
present, however, are the smiling faces of children. So where is the emotional appeal? For one,
the childrens smiling faces encourage the audience to want to help. To keep the smiles on the
kids faces, the audience can provide food so the children can continue to live happily. Also,
the pathos lies within the startling facts that appear on every page. More than 16 million kids in
America live in households that struggle to put food on the tableThats 1 out of 5 kids
Facts such as these are somewhat startling, and because they revolve around children, they are all
the more touching and saddening to the audience. NoKidHungry.org is a credible website and
corporation. They partner with other corporations, organizations, and foundations. No Kid
Hungry pairs with over 150 community, state, and national allies. There is no question as to
whether or not these facts are accurate. No Kid Hungry states that their partners are the
cornerstone of Team No Kid Hungry. With credible resources, the facts become truer,
heightening the emotional appeal and urgency of the situation at hand.
Childhood hunger is a problem that made itself present over 25 years ago. A small
organization founded by a brother and sister soon blossomed into a movement that would end up
raising over 24 million dollars. No Kid Hungry: Share Our Strength uses logos, the argument of
a problem paired with a solution, and pathos to persuade their audience into understanding the
seriousness of childhood hunger. This website evaluates the importance of finding a solution to
childhood hunger, and uses pathos to further persuade its audience to become a part of the effort
to solve this problem. There is no doubt that NoKidHungry.org is effective in involving
Americans in the effort to give children a better childhood, and in the long run, an enhanced
adulthood simply by providing a donation of only 10 dollars, because for every dollar donated, a
child receives 10 meals. No Kid Hungry stresses that it is not a shortage of food in America that
is the problem, but barriers that keep many children from accessing this food. The problem is
easily solvable, but only if Americans are willing to help, No Kid Hungry asks us to Take the
Pledge to be a part of the solution. Exactly 454,687 people have pledged to help end childhood
hunger, and this number is steadily growing as more people become aware of the problem the
United States faces. Will you take the pledge to end childhood hunger?



Works Cited
No Kid Hungry Network, . N.p.. Web. 14 Oct 2013. <http://www.nokidhungry.org/>.