Asianna Lotito

Founder, Sweet Friend Foundation

Asianna’s passion for helping others is in her blood. In spite of time and resource constraints, Asianna’s hard working single mother of twins had the family volunteering regularly for local charities and homeless shelters. Her father, an interior designer, also instilled a volunteer mindset in her by encouraging her to volunteer for a local animal shelter where he spent his time making kitty condos.

As an adult, Asianna has carried on this giving spirit with her volunteer work and fundraising for Meals On Wheels, raising over $70,000. While there she also volunteered for the Pinellas County School District’s Lunch Pal program where she began mentoring a young boy. This experience exposed Asianna to the needs of lower income children within the school district. Many of these children go without school supplies, clothing, and money for field trips making them unable to participate in school activities.

This inspired Asianna to raise funds to take the entire elementary school, all expenses paid, to a Rays baseball game - an experience many of these children had never before had. This work earned her the Outstanding Volunteer of the Year Award in 2023 from a pool of 30,000 volunteers.

Out of all of this the Sweet Friend Foundation was born with a dream to enable students to develop social and emotional intelligence through shared positive experiences. Asianna wants to turn that dream into a reality by being a sweet friend to Pinellas County Schools.