Happy New Year! On our first episode of the New Year, we are so happy to bring you an amazing human, Hunter Beaton. Hunter is the founder of Day1bags.org. Day1’s mission is right in line with Comfort Cases’ mission: to provide hope and dignity to youth in foster care by giving them new luggage or backpacks in place of the disgusting black trash bags that are still given out in so many states.

Hunter started this initiative in 2016 at the age of 15 as part of his Eagle Scout project (yes, he’s a Real Eagle Scout!). He initially provided 100 duffel bags filled with essential supplies to a local nonprofit serving foster youth in San Antonio, Texas. The project quickly became a sustainable mission to support foster children across the United States.

Hunter's work has led to significant milestones, including distributing over 220,000 bags to foster youth across 47 states, legislative advocacy for proper luggage bills, and initiatives that celebrate foster youth's achievements. Through Day 1 Bags, Hunter has inspired meaningful change and continues to empower children in foster care by promoting dignity, belonging, and recognition.

To learn more about Hunter and Day1Bags - and how you can support them, please visit the following links:

Website:

https://day1bags.org/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/day1bags

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/day1bags/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/day-1-bags/

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Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year! This is our final episode of Fostering Change before we launch into 2025. And what a year it’s been. We’ve celebrated amazing guests on our show, learning so much about each other and our society.

Thank you to all of you who have written in with comments and guests suggestions about what you’ve listened to this year. We truly appreciate YOU ALL!

Our charity, Comfort Cases has touched so many people around the country this year, with Rob Scheer once again sharing our message of providing hope and dignity for youth in foster care. It’s not too late to make one last donation if this is possible for you. If this is something you would like to do, to help out our most important people, youth entering foster care, please click on this link or here: https://comfortcases.org/ to become a #Bagbuster to help us stop the evil practice of giving trash bags to our youth.

Thank you!

As for today’s Christmas Eve episode, we end the year with a Very Special Guest: Chef Art Smith. You may initially recognize him as Oprah’s personal Chef, a role he held for 10 years. He is also the founder of Common Threads, a non-profit organization teaching low-income children to cook wholesome and affordable meals since 2003. He believes that through hands-on cooking and introducing children to fresh foods we can help prevent childhood obesity, reverse the trend of poor eating habits, and learn about diversity and tolerance through the celebration of our cultural differences and our commonalities.

Chef Art has appeared on numerous national television appearances including ABC’s Lady Gaga Thanksgiving Special, Top Chef, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Iron Chef America, The Today Show, Good Morning America, Nightline, Fox News, Extra, Entertainment Tonight, BBQ Pitmasters, The Talk, The Dr. Oz Show and of course, The Oprah Winfrey Show.

Chef Art has appeared on the cover of Parade Magazine, and has been featured in Cooking Light magazine. He is a regular contributor to Standup magazine, whose proceeds benefit The Ben Foundation, which raises awareness of the long-term, damaging effects of bullying.

To learn more about Chef Art Smith, please visit:

Website: https://www.chefartsmith.com/

Instagram: @thechefartsmith

Facebook: ChefArtSmith

X/Twitter: @chefartsmith

To learn more about Common Threads, please visit:

Website: https://www.commonthreads.org/

Instagram: @commonthreadsorg

Facebook: CommonThreadsOrg

X/Twitter: @commonthreadsUS

Thank you again for listening and watching Fostering Change. We hope you have a happy and safe holiday and look forward to bringing you more great discussions in 2025. Again, if you have any comments or guest suggestions, please feel free to reach out by emailing our producers at info@comfortcases.org.

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Welcome back to another thought-provoking episode of Fostering Change. Today, we speak with Jason Green, a friend and amazing filmmaker. Jason’s documentary, Finding Fellowship, is a story of hope about the unlikely merger of three segregated churches in the 1960s. Jason and Rob belong to this same church, which is how they first met, and both have the same passion for community coming together.

We thought today would be a perfect time to share this interview in the spirit of the holiday season.

Following the episode, we encourage you to watch Finding Fellowship. You can find it on PBS, or click the following link to stream it on PBS.org: https://www.pbs.org/show/finding-fellowship/

If you have any comments or questions, please get in touch with us at info@comfortcases.org. There is just one more episode before the New Year, which posts on Christmas Eve—with someone we know you will love to meet!

To learn more about Jason and Finding Fellowship:

Instagram: @jg1732

Twitter/X: @jg1732

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasongerardgreen/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.