For low-income families, it can be incredibly difficult to celebrate their children’s birthdays.
Families may go to extremes to provide a meaningful celebration for their children by taking out payday loans, borrowing from family and friends or foregoing paying rent and utility bills. Parents even resort to skipping meals to stretch the food budget in order to put aside money for a child’s upcoming birthday.
Birthday Connections hopes to change that. The new Kansas City-area nonprofit aims to provide the means for children to experience the birthday of their dreams.
"The kids, the families, they're going through trauma and chaos and to go without celebrating can be very damaging to a child," says Benita Webber, founder of Birthday Connections. "We know and we see from research the importance for a child to celebrate their birthday".
- Benita Webber, founder of Birthday Connections
- Alexis Turner, children's case manager at the Rosebrook Center
