Food Drive Finished

Well, not exactly finished. We still have three or four families whose numbers were disconnected or not accurate to find. I'm feeling, um, melancholy or something like it after year two of the food drive. Year one was amazing. We collected 5,500 items with ease.
This year, every turn had an obstacle. Two stores, Wal-Mart and Shaw's "changed" policies which disallowed our student from collecting food at the same time as the Salvation Army. One of the stores was particularly nearsighted and downright rude. But, both locations gave us times on Sunday, when the Salvation Army wasn't collecting. Our local IGA store provided some hours, but not nearly enough (however, I will point out that their customers were by far the most generous).
We added a Fill-the-Bus event, which didn't come close to reaching our projected total for the day--apparently Winter Storm Albert scared people away from the event. I also think our advertising could use some improvement.
But in the end, I shouldn't complain about collecting 5,800 items, 300 more than last year, and helping 16 families, twice as many as last year. It's just that I know what this food drive can look like, and how many students could be participating. The question is, how do we convince our student body and faculty that this is one of the greatest opportunities of their school year to learn something truly important?

Round One Total

After our first round of collection dates this past weekend, Food Drive 2.0 has reached 2,500 items. Unfortunately that is only 1/4 of the way to our goal. We have a second round next weekend plus a Fill-The-Bus event.

Insider

This evening began our 2nd Annual Food Drive. The bitter cold has settled over New England just in time. I feel good about our start--maybe 400 items on night one at a small local grocery story. And then....
I clicked on ESPN to find out that the distinguished baseball reporter, Peter Gammons, is leaving ESPN--presumably to retire. His farewell caused tears and laughter. It reminded me of two things: I love baseball, and I love great writing.
Thanks, Peter Gammons. Thanks for your class. Thanks for your insight. Thanks for loving the game of baseball and sharing that love with us.

Tis The Season

to send you over to the EduCarnival.

And an update on Food Drive 2.0: We started today--with a snow day. Our first round of collections at grocery stores begins this Friday. A week from Saturday, we will host the first ever Fill-the-Bus event on the front lawn of our school. On Monday, a local radio broadcast kindly gave us air time, and this Saturday, we will be featured in our local newspaper. This should go a long way towards helping us reach our goal of 10,000 items. I will keep you all posted.