CHILDREN’S CHAMPION

It was while working as a prosecutor in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office that Darby Hills developed a passion for children who face abuse and neglect. She also volunteered for a number of charities in Chicago where she learned up close how children are affected when their essential needs are not being met.

Hills already had a child of her own when she moved to Barrington and sought out opportunities to continue her dedication to needy children. Twelve years ago, she and her husband, Tom, founded Barrington Children’s Charities to explore ways to support children in and around Barrington.

“I wanted to be able to help underprivileged children, so I put my feelers out there and started meeting with other families, teachers, and community leaders,” Hills recalls. “I discovered there were children getting breakfast and lunch through free and reduced lunch programs, and I wondered what they were doing for food on the weekends when they weren’t in school.”

Every school in Barrington School District 220 has students who are eligible for free or subsidized meals, and Hills says she was shocked by the overall number of kids in the program. Her husband suggested she start a nonprofit charity and Barrington Children’s Charities was born. Hills and her husband worked to put together a volunteer board of men and women from around the community who bring a broad range of experience to the organization.

Through a close partnership with Barrington School District 220, Barrington Children’s Charities provides food for students in subsidized school meal programs that they can take home after school. The organization developed its own food distribution program called Packs of Plenty (P.O.P.). Charity volunteers source and purchase all the food from wholesale food distributors, manage the inventory, set up packing stations, and pack bags every Thursday of the school year. But there it more to it than providing food.

“We started learning more about the other needs the kids have, such as eyeglasses and dental care,” explains Hills. “We created a Lens for Learning program for eyeglasses and partnered with Smile Illinois to bring mobile dental units into the community twice a year to do teeth cleanings, fill cavities, and meet other dental needs.”

Over the years, Hills says, the organization has evolved into an essential needs charity. Many might be surprised by how broad those needs are, even in wealthier communities where it’s assumed there are enough public resources to ensure everyone’s needs are met. But that’s just not the case.

“People often say to me, ‘Barrington is an affluent community, there’s no need there,’ and I can tell you we’re feeding kids in every single school in our district, including all eight elementary schools, the early learning center, both middle schools, and the high school” she says. “There’s a need, and unfortunately, it’s increasing with rising food costs. Our numbers are going up but we’re able to provide for them.”

And Barrington Children’s Charities meets these needs without any paid staff. Its board of directors, accountants, fundraisers, menu planners, and food preparers are all volunteers, as well as those who arrange the mobile dental services and eyecare. Supporters of the organization can be assured their donations are going directly to benefit needy children.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time now and when I first started, I didn’t realize it would grow as much as it has,” observes Hills. “I’ve been overwhelmed by the community support, and it’s been great to see how the community rallies around us.”

Each Thursday, volunteers of all ages gather at Sunny Hill Elementary School in Carpentersville. They come from all over the region. Young moms, seniors who bus in from The Garlands in Barrington, volunteers from area churches. They pack food in an assembly line into bags that are tied and then loaded into large IKEA bags that get delivered to each of the schools in District 220. School staffers then deliver the bags to students.

“It’s quite an undertaking but I’ll tell you it pretty much works like clockwork at this point. Everyone enjoys their role,” Hills says. “It’s rare what we’re doing because we’re not just in one school but an entire school district. The partnership with the district is phenomenal.”

Representatives from Barrington Children’s Charities regularly meet with the superintendent and principals, some of whom have become Thursday volunteers, to ensure they remain tuned into the charity’s work. Hills has also met with some of the families the organization supports and is inspired by those conversations. “They are all really hard-working families. Single moms and people in all different situations,” says Hills.

“They are definitely appreciative of the bags and the other services we provide.”

For more information about Barrington Children’s Charities or to donate, visit barringtonchildrenscharities.com.