Gracie Mikol is a current Junior at the University of Notre Dame, and will graduate in the spring of 2022. She is in the Mendoza College of Business as a management consulting major with an innovation and entrepreneurship minor and a sustainability minor. Gracie is also a member of SCNO (Student Consulting for Non-Profits), Adopt a Family Christmas, and the co-vice president of Transpose Dance Collective. She founded the nonprofit Fueled By Kids in 2016 to provide meals to food-insecure children.
Fueled By Kids is fighting against COVID-19 by helping to assure that students whose families were already food insecure or have become food insecure because of COVID-19 have a guaranteed source of food all week long. Children who live in homes that suffer from food insecurity face a high amount of uncertainty in their everyday lives which can prevent them from focusing on school work. Fueled By Kids attempts to relieve that uncertainty by making sure that these children have a guaranteed source of food all week long. Fueled By Kids works with the Manchester School District to identify and pass out bags at public elementary schools on Friday afternoons, combined with the National School Lunch Program, which provides students from low-income households with free or reduced breakfast and lunch at school, Fueled By Kids’ weekend food bag assures these students have two meals a day every day of the week. When COVID-19 became an issue in the Manchester area, the non-profit worked with the assistant superintendent to assure that its services would continue to be provided. Eight busses follow bus routes every weekday passing out bags of breakfast and lunch, bags go on the busses every Friday to continue to provide weekend food. The non-profit also increased its number of weekly bags provided to 600 from 400 to try to respond to the increased need for our services as a result of COVID-19.
“Notre Dame is focused on teaching us how to be leaders in not only business, but also in our communities. I started Fueled By Kids when I was in high school and what attracted me to Notre Dame was its commitment to giving back. I may not want to have a career in nonprofits, but Notre Dame is showing me how I can always keep giving back in my life. Our professors encourage us to find success in whatever industry interests us but also reminds us that to be truly successful we must use that success to help those less fortunate than us.” -Gracie Mikol