Southside’s student leadership team flooded into Blair’s last week to shop. 

While there were some expected purchases — cereal — the students were not shopping for themselves but for families in need. 

The students were using some of the money raised in the school’s recent food drive — the penny drive raised $931.02 and the student leadership team added enough to make an even $1,000 — to buy certain items. One group, for instance, went after breakfast items, another went after canned goods. 

The students had to stay on a tight budget with each group having $22 to spend, so, with help from teachers with calculators, it was a helpful lesson in math and finance as well. 

The school also picked up a pallet of food that had been pre-ordered with the bulk of the money raised to take to the Loaves and Fishes food pantry.  

“Last year we did a similar penny drive and took all the funds to spend at the grocery store,” said Southside’s Heidi Dicks. “After clearing a lot of Blair's shelves, we did things a little different this year! Jason at Blair’s was great to work with and helped us order the pallet of needed items for Loaves and Fishes.”  

The students finished at Loaves and Fishes, dropping off a total of 512 pounds of food. 

Over at Westside, students participated in a two-week-long fundraiser for Loaves and Fishes dubbed “Deck the Beards.” Each teacher’s face was decked out with a Santa hat and beard and then posted to a board. For every dollar brought in, students got to stick a decoration on the beard of their choice.

Patrick Spiker’s fifth grade class topped the field, bringing in $145 and completely covering Mr. Spiker’s beard (and the surrounding board) with Christmas stickers.

In total, the school raised over $900 while donating another 115 pounds of food.

“It is always heartwarming to see how generous our Westside family can be,” said IMC Clerk/Student Council Adviser Stephanie Belmont.