Hersey High School food drive sets record in 39th year
The 39th annual Hersey High School Thanksgiving Food Drive broke collection records, rounding up 45,051 cans of food and $5,658.64.
“The success of the food drive is due to the amount of work and effort put in by our entire school community,” said Service Over Self Coordinator Mark Gunther. “There is a great deal of planning that is involved with this project.”
The food drive started with a schoolwide video presentation put together by SOS students that stressed the need, purpose and history of the food drive at the Arlington Heights school. The following day, student council members visited classes to explain students could chose to collect cans, participate in the bag-and-tag community effort, and/or sponsor a food box for a Hersey family.
Service Over Self students stapled announcements to 10,000 bags donated by Garden Fresh Foods and delivered them to classes to distribute to houses in their assigned area. One week later, students went back to pick up the donated food.
In addition, individual classes and students could participate by donating cans, money, and/or family food boxes filled with about 25 food items. This year, due to the current economic conditions, 66 boxes were prepared and delivered to families in the Hersey community, a sharp increase over previous years. They included a turkey, donated by Family Video of Arlington Heights, and a $20 gift card for the purchase of perishable items.
On Nov. 19, classes brought all collected food and money to the cafeteria to be sorted and boxed with help from employees of the Arlington Heights Doubletree Hotel. Students loaded it into three trucks donated by Route 12 Rental, and 55 students headed to two locations for delivery: the St. Augustine Center for American Indians and the Community and Economic Development Association (CEDA) in Mount Prospect.
Wil Kozlowski, founder of Hersey's SOS organization, started a partnership with the St. Augustine Center in Chicago's uptown neighborhood, one of the most impoverished in Chicago, more than 30 years ago, and Hersey has been delivering food there since. Six years ago, Hersey began assisting CEDA, whose food supply had become so diluted that it was only accepting emergency cases.
“This is the best day of the year for me,” said Student Council Advisor George Bedingfield. “It is an awesome sight to watch our young people give of themselves to help out those who are in need. Seeing our entire school community come together for a common cause is fantastic.”
Student Council President Glennah McMahon added, “I can't thank our community enough for their support. The response to this year's bag-and-tag event is what helped us surpass our goal of 40,000 cans this year. I couldn't be prouder of our school and community.”