About Blessings in a Backpack
What is Blessings in a Backpack?
Blessings in a Backpack is the national nonprofit feeding school-aged kids on weekends — food sent home each Friday "for school-aged children across America who might otherwise go hungry." Started in Louisville in 2005 (a 501(c)(3) since 2008), it now runs 1,200+ programs through seven regional chapters and provided over 3 million hunger-free weekends for children in the 2023-24 school year alone.
Where will I work?
Across the US: current openings are executive, finance and development roles (VP Finance in Chicago, managing directors in Florida and the Southeast) — professional nonprofit leadership work, mostly remote-friendly.
What is the Blessings team like?
Around 120 staff amplified by thousands of volunteers — the compact professional core of a volunteer-powered movement, where a finance hire's spreadsheet literally converts to fed kids.
Work-Life Balance
The mission is Fridays — and so is the benefit: its postings list "Paid Winter Break, Summer Fridays, FSA Plan, 403(b)…" and the careers page details a generous stack: "16 days of PTO, minimum that increases with tenure · 10 paid holidays · Four mental health days · Two floating holidays per year · Birthday Day" plus an annual paid Winter Break and three months' paid parental leave.
Perks and Benefits
- Summer Fridays + annual paid Winter Break
- 16+ PTO days (rising with tenure) + 10 holidays + 2 floating + Birthday Day
- Four mental-health days per year
- Three months paid parental leave
- $350/month medical-premium contribution (even if not enrolled) + dental/vision/FSA
- Free life insurance + short-term disability; retirement income plan; cell-phone reimbursement
How we verified this listing
Three of four live postings on the nonprofit's own board carried the Summer Fridays block when we listed it (the fourth is a junior chapter role), and its careers page publishes the full benefits list — double-sourced from its own materials, with numbers rather than adjectives. Review-site ratings were unreachable at add time, disclosed as with the entire cohort; a nonprofit that gives staff four mental-health days and a winter shutdown is practicing what its mission preaches.