For most kids, a birthday means cake, decorations, candles, and maybe a favorite theme. But 14-year-old West Palm Beach resident Tali Shear started wondering what birthdays look like for families who are already struggling to afford groceries. So, she decided to do something about it.
While completing a community project last year during eighth grade at Saint Andrew’s School in Boca Raton, Tali created a birthday bag program for families who use the food pantry at Ferd & Gladys Alpert Jewish Family Service. Each bag contains the basics needed to make a small birthday celebration at home (cups, plates, napkins, a tablecloth, candles, and a Publix gift card), all packaged inside bags decorated by Tali and other local kids with colorful birthday messages, stickers, and kid-friendly themes.
Her idea was simple: A parent shouldn’t have to choose between buying groceries and making their child’s birthday feel special.
Tali knows how meaningful those celebrations can be. Growing up, she loved having themed birthday parties of her own, and she wanted other children to have that same feeling of being celebrated.
Since launching the project in August 2025, Tali has created approximately 100 birthday bags. She recruited her ice-skating friends, neighborhood kids, and friends from summer camp to help decorate and assemble them. She pays attention to what kids are excited about — including current movies and popular characters — when choosing themes, and she has even created special bags for first birthdays.
The bags now have their own place on the shelves of the Alpert JFS food pantry in West Palm Beach, where Tali also volunteers to unpack and shelve food.
Now a ninth grader, Tali hopes the project will grow beyond her own circle. Her goal is to get more students and communities involved, with young people potentially creating their own branches of the birthday bag program.
“I thought about how it might be harder for food-insecure families to have a birthday party,” Tali said. “This allows them to celebrate without taking away from their budget to pay for food, clothing, or something else essential.”
Tali was recognized with the Future Leader Award at the Alpert JFS annual meeting earlier this year.
Her advice for other youth leaders? A good idea becomes much more achievable when you first organize it, answer the practical questions, and then start bringing others into it.
