The Center for Community Engaged Learning (CCEL) conducted their eighth annual Give a Little Feed a Lot food drive on Sept. 17. Around 9:30 a.m., registration started on the Green Space and teams got ready to head out to the streets of Manchester and collect all donated items.
Each team was given a route to collect bags of food from. Then they climbed on to a school bus to be dropped off at their specified location. At their bus stop, teams were given a shopping cart donated by Hannaford’s for the event. The carts were very helpful when collecting the bags of food along the roads.
Many teams had so much food that their carriages overflowed as they headed back to their bus stop. After the volunteers returned to the school bus, they headed back to Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU) for some food and festivities.
Outreach Association, along with a co-sponsorship from the Student Government Association (SGA), hosted a get-together for all the volunteers with lawn games and BBQ foods. There was also music provided by Radio SNHU throughout the entire event.
As volunteers enjoyed their time eating lunch and relaxing after their busy morning, they could watch the CCEL staff unloading the bags of collected food items from the vans. For the first time in the eight years of doing this food drive, CCEL had to call the New Hampshire food bank to send a second truck to come pick up the extra food.
Freshman Madison Rabbitt said, “Getting back after walking around all day and seeing that we filled one truck and needed another was the best feeling because I knew it was going to make so many people happy and safe, knowing they had their next meal coming.”
This year, the food drive brought in 7,040 pounds of food that was then sent off to the New Hampshire Food Bank. This food will be sorted and then distributed back to people and families of the Manchester community.
