Hi there! We're ShiftLeft, a small Denton organization focusing on supporting local artists, strengthening our community, and keeping hope alive through IRL communication and mutual aid.

Earlier this month, we hosted our first event - the Earlyween Show and Market! We were able to raise over $200 just from $5 door fees and funny pin sales :) We're so overjoyed about how well it went that we want to give back by donating those funds to help pay off school lunch debts in Denton ISD.

Did you know that the average school meal cost per child in the United States is $566 annually? Many parents are unable to afford this high cost of school meals, leading to a child's lunch balance going into the negatives, building up debt that needs to be paid back before they're allowed to purchase meals again.

Texas leads at #1 in the country, with 1,673,600 food-insecure children and $930,521,600 in meal debt.*

We're super excited to be able to help where we can by giving our Earlyween funds to the district, but we'd love to be able to do even more. If you can, please donate to reduce even more lunch debt in our community. A school lunch in Denton costs $3.40, so with our goal of $500, we could pay off a total of 147 meals.

Thanks so much for any contribution to our cause, and even if you're unable to donate, there's plenty to do! Keep an eye out for our next events, check out some Denton volunteering opportunities, keep yourself educated, happy, and healthy! There are so many people fighting the good fight, we can make things better together.

*Source: (www.educationdata.org/school-lunch-debt)