Impactful Power Packs

Another year for the All In Food Drive at Anderson

After hours of volunteering and countless contributions from students and staff, two thousand eight hundred and seventy “Power Packs” were prepared and sent to the IPM food pantry. The district-wide All In Food Drive receives contributions in different ways from different schools; Anderson’s Power Packs—assembled during the Freshman day of service—are a unique and important way to give back.

“I think it’s a great event. I was interested in doing it because I think it's a really cool thing that is special to Anderson. I’m not aware of any high schools that do anything like that,”  Mr. DeLotell said.

Mr. DeLotell has been involved in managing the food drive at Anderson for four years. For the past fifteen years, Anderson’s contributions to the food drive have been essential to the IPM food bank in Mt. Carmel.

“We’re fortunate here that we have a lot of students but we also have a really supportive community. Because the food drive is great and student involvement is great—student groups like Key Club help collect the food—but also, if we didn’t have a community that donated the food, this wouldn’t be possible. So it’s also important that we are in a community that believes in this and supports it,” Mr. DeLotell said. 

Before the freshman day of service, in which the Power Packs are made, the food is collected by volunteers at Kroger. Members of DECA, Key Club, National Honors Society, and Teachers Academy volunteered this year. Sophomore Kripa Hari found out about the opportunity through Key Club.

“I liked knowing that I was doing something helpful for the community. It's a nice use of your time and you also get to work on a bunch of different skills. I had to work on my presentation skills with meeting new people and such,” Hari (10) said. 

Then, after organization from the staff and students, the freshman begin their day of service. The students are assigned different tasks for most efficiency. The sorters go around the stations with ziplock bags, gathering various types of non-perishable food from the different stations.

“They would bring in a bunch of bags of food and the sorters would go and sort the food around to different tables. Then, we’d go back to get more bags. [We] just repeated that process again. I liked doing sorting because I thought it was more fun,” Vivian Schneck (9) said.

As this was one of the most successful years, the freshman and other student volunteers had to stay motivated and positive throughout the process. 

“If you’re there and you’re moping around it’s not going to be fun, but if you think about what you’re doing and how it can help other people who might need [it], you will get more out of it and enjoy it,” Schneck (9) said. 

Volunteering for Anderson students almost always begins with the freshman day of service; it is important because the students get to personally see their impact. 

“I think it’s important for students to recognize and understand that we’re really fortunate to live where we live and be surrounded by people who want to support community service. And part of our responsibility is that we contribute to that because we live here too,” DeLotell said.