Trivia helps hunger

Hunt is a junior business major and can be reached at katherine.hunt@drake.edu

Some people believe charity is money that is given to the needy and homeless by rich people. However, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary disagrees. It states: “Charity: benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity: aid given to those in need.”

With this more accurate definition in mind, there is a way that a completely broke college student can give to charity while studying for her English classes. Does this sound too good to be true? Freerice.com is a website where every correct answer gives ten grains of rice to a person in need.

Freerice.com got its start back in October 2007 by a man named John Breen. Two years later, Breen donated the website to Freerice’s current owner and sponsor, the United Nations World Food Programme. Located in Rome, Italy, they are the world’s largest humanitarian agency with the sole purpose of fighting global hunger. This nonprofit corporation is funded by voluntary donations from a plethora of locations, including businesses, organizations and even regular people.

Today, freerice.com has two simple goals. Its first goal is to provide everyone with free education in some way or another. Secondly, to help end world hunger by providing rice to the hungry for free. Playing on freerice.com is extremely simple. Once on the site, a user selects the correct answer from four possible choices. A bowl is shown on the right indicating how many grains have been donated during the current session. The level can be adjusted from one to 60, based on academic progress. This way, everyone can play freerice.com in a fun yet challenging way. Users can play for one question or for hours on end.

Freerice.com doesn’t just stop with donating rice to people in need. Depending on the country that is allocated the rice at the time, freerice.com purchases rice from that country. That way, in addition to minimizing costs such as handling and transportation, the local economy is supported, which ultimately helps even more people.

With the current global problems and economic issues that seem to face every college student on campus, it’s nice to know that there actually is at least one way to truly give back to others. After all, who knew that studying and reviewing simple words would go hand in hand with donating life-saving food to others?