When Jeremy Seitz learned that his son’s school was launching a food drive, he watched the video below on the school’s Facebook page. He learned about the many children in the Roanoke Valley who were going home each weekend with little or no food in the house. In an effort to stem this tragic situation, Clearbrook Elementary School was teaming up with New Hope Christian Church to support the Pack a Sack program.
Here’s how it works: each week volunteers meet to pack non-perishable, single serve items in back packs for students to take home every Friday. With a growing number of recipients, the need for donations is great. “I couldn’t believe how many students were suffering,â€Â says Jeremy. “I knew I had to do something to help.â€Â
As a student studying network security at ECPI University’s Roanoke campus, Jeremy figured the best place to start was with his fellow students, faculty, and staff. So, he came up with a pretty clever way of encouraging everyone to donate. In the spirit of the campaign year, he decided to create an election of sorts. What he needed was five faculty and staff members willing to serve as “candidates.â€Â
Students, faculty, and staff were all encouraged to bring in healthy, nutritious food items, and for each one donated, they could cast a vote. On March 23, they’ll tally the votes and the candidate with the most will have to wear a bunny costume – yes, a bunny costume – and greet incoming students on the first day of the next term.
Not surprisingly, a large number of the donations are coming from the candidates themselves, using each item as a vote for one of their “competitors.â€Â Essentially, each of these good-natured souls are sacrificing a bit of their dignity in order to give it to others who most need it:
- Campus President Michael Traas
- Cyber and Network Security Faculty Member Michael Donodeo
- Medical Assisting Faculty Member Larissa Sellers
- Campus Director of Nursing (RN) Jennifer Barger
- Student Success Coordinator Scott Warman
So far, nearly 1,300 items have been collected on campus with more to come. Student Success Coordinator Scott Warman just brought in an additional 407 donations.
“I’m casting all 407 of these votes for Michael Donodeo,â€Â says Warman. “You won’t catch me wearing any bunny costume! Seriously though, this is tremendous problem and we are just trying to use a little bit of levity to motivate people to donate. This is something these children should not have to deal with. They are innocents and we are going to do all we can to help them.â€Â
DISCLAIMER – ECPI University makes no claim, warranty, or guarantee as to actual employability or earning potential to current, past or future students or graduates of any educational program we offer. The ECPI University website is published for informational purposes only. Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of information contained on the ECPI.edu domain; however, no warranty of accuracy is made. No contractual rights, either expressed or implied, are created by its content.
For more information about ECPI University or any of our programs click here: http://www.ecpi.edu/ or http://ow.ly/Ca1ya.