Reaching Beyond Limits

The Greater Wyoming Valley Area YMCA partners with Reaching Beyond Limits to serve youth and families throughout Luzerne County with lunches and snacks over the summer via the Food & Fun in the Park Program. This food targets youth who would otherwise be qualified for and receive free lunches during school year.

Reaching Beyond Limits is a workforce development program for special needs teens and young adults to learn job skills and appropriate social interactions within the workforce.

RBL helpers pack coolers and boxes with food and snacks, bound for eight YMCA-staffed Food & Fun sites, and two additional playground programs. Some of the RBL youth stay at the Y, stuffing and rolling wraps, assembling home-made pepperoni lunchables, and counting and packing fruit cups for the next day. Others go to the various playground sites to assist with bi-weekly food distributions for families. When all sites are operating, Reaching Beyond Limits at the YMCA Food & Fun program makes, assembles and packs over 250 lunches and 250 snacks daily.

In addition to acting as the base camp for the Food & Fun in the Park Program, the Wilkes-Barre Family YMCA serves as a distribution site itself, feeding more than 10 children daily, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., weekdays from June 23 to Friday, August 15.

Thank you to all that work hard to keep this program alive and well as well as the YMCA RBL youth and staff: Jay McDermott, Kayden Karalunas, Andrew Goodrich, Dante Gipdon, Bryce Crawford, Matt Endress (YMCA RBL Worksite Trainer). Park site RBL youth: Camden Bryant, Pashalae Armstrong, Dash Armstrong, Austin Baker and Joe Peck (Park site RBL Worksite Trainer). Special thanks to YMCA site supervisor, Deanna Ellsworth, Careerlink Summer Worker, Nathan Rodrigruez and Food & Fun Program Director, Lennae Thompson Pellam.