HOSA hosted a food drive on Nov. 20, and Key Club hosted a food drive Dec. 1 to Dec. 12.
“We will donate it to the Lampasas Mission, like we do every year,” U.S. History teacher and Key Club adviser Danelle Ecker said.
Key Club’s goal is to donate more than 2,000 pounds of food.
“Some teachers provide extra credit [for donating food],” Ecker said. “Otherwise, students can just bring donated items to me. Some clubs allow their community hours to be food donations.”
Ecker said they would have usually done the drive before Thanksgiving, but since there were so many other food drives taking place, they decided to move it to before Christmas.
“There are over 400 families in Lampasas County that rely on the Lampasas Mission and the Central Texas Food Bank to help them feed their families,” Ecker said. “When the mission has run out of the supply provided by the Central Texas Food Bank, it is up to the community to help them feed the hungry in our community. We do what we can to help.”
Senior Juan Rodriguez said Key Club’s goal is to feed as many families as they can, so any amount of food is better than no food.
“We are asking for non-perishable items for the Christmas season such as boxed goods, canned goods, rice and noodles (not ramen),” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez said they are thankful for those who have given donations.
“As of now, we have posters spread out all over the school giving information about the food drive,” Rodriguez said. “We also have an announcement made.”
Key Club has offered the incentive of a popcorn party for the academic period that collects the most food.
“The food drive means a lot to me because I know how much more it will mean to the families and people we are able to provide with food, and especially with the season of giving coming up, it’s no better time to give to those in need,” Rodriguez said.
HOSA sponsor Karalyn Baker said HOSA raised 556 pounds of food this year.
“We took the food down to the Lampasas Mission,” Baker said. “We received all sorts of food and mostly canned goods and boxed goods.”
Baker said they hoped to receive a good amount of food, and she believes that goal was reached.
“We did several things to raise awareness to people to donate food,” senior Giselle Ruperto said. “We hung up flyers around the school and in public places. We also made sure to spread it around social media, like Facebook!”
Ruperto said they simply wanted to gather as much as they could to help their community.
“To me, this food drive is a chance to give back to the community and even be more connected to our community when we all pitch in to help others,” Ruperto said.
