Thanksgiving 2018 Volunteer Opportunities In North Carolina

Thanksgiving is about more than just turkey, football, parades and card games. It’s about being thankful for what you have, and giving back to those struggling the most.

If that sounds like you, consider hitting up one of the following food banks in North Carolina in the coming days. Each was ranked among the top 40 in America on Tuesday by the financial news and opinion site 24/7 Wall St.

MANNA FoodBank

• Rank: 6th
• Location: Asheville, N.C.
• Charity Navigator rating: 99.1/100
• Total raised: $28,576,600
• Percentage of expenses spent on programs and services: 94.9%

Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest North Carolina

• Rank: 36th
• Location: Winston-Salem, N.C.
• Charity Navigator rating: 96.5/100
• Total raised: $58,899,982
• Percentage of expenses spent on programs and services: 97.5%

If you’re looking for other volunteer and donation opportunities, here are some you might also consider.

Friendship Trays

• Location: Charlotte
• Rating: 98.32

Habitat for Humanity of Charlotte

• Location: Charlotte
• Rating: 95.47

Classroom Central

• Location: Charlotte
• Rating: 94.74

Foundation For The Carolinas

• Location: Charlotte
• Rating: 94.34

Carolina Raptor Center

• Location: Huntersville, NC
• Rating: 87.96

Your turn: Do you have a volunteer opportunity you’d like to share? Tell us in the comments or on Facebook.

About 40 million people lived in food-insecure households last year, including 6.5 million children, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service. This means that 12 percent of the country at some point lived in a place where they were “uncertain of having, or unable to acquire, enough food to meet the needs of all their members” due to lack of money and other resources.

The prevalence of food insecurity is highest in the South and lowest in the Northeast, according to the USDA. In North Carolina, it was above the national average from 2015-17.

The 24/7 Wall St. food bank rankings were based on ratings calculated by the site Charity Navigator, an organization that assesses charities for accountability, transparency and financial health.

Food banks typically don’t give out food themselves. Rather, they collect and distribute food to smaller hunger-relief charities, according to the organization Feeding America. This usually includes basic provisions and non-perishable items.

Food pantries, meanwhile, are the arms that reach out into communities directly, particularly those that need the most support.

(For more news like this, find your local Patch here. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here.)

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.

Photo credit: Shutterstock