Little fingers reach into cardboard boxes, pulling out canned and boxed food donations. Students line the donations up into groups of ten, counting them and discussing whether they are rectangular prisms or cylinders. These tasks are all part of JFK’s annual holiday food drive that is run by Brittany Bednarczyk and her first grade class.
“It started two years ago,” Bednarczyk said. “In social studies, we were talking about how to be good citizens as part of our curriculum. Later, we were solving a word problem in math that involved kids collecting cans. My students started to talk about it and wondered if they could do a food drive too.”
Bednarczyk went to school Principal Dr. Frank Zamperlin and, after the class presented the idea to him, JFK’s annual food drive was born.
“I thought it was such a nice way to teach them civic responsibility and the importance of kindness and helping others in our community. They really enjoy working together and being involved in this special event.”
This year, students collected – and counted -- about 600 items. The food was donated to the Brewster Community Food Pantry.
“We do math to involve the students more so that they actually see the food coming in,” Bednarczyk said. “The kids love it. They’re so excited and they can’t believe how much we collect.”
Thank you to everyone in the community for your help in continuing to make this food drive a big success.