Although the outcome of the Super Bowl might not have been what most NHS students expected, the Souper Bowl was one good outcome of the event. There were numerous seminar classes that entered the Souper Bowl food drive contest. The contest was created to help collect canned goods for students that are in need. Nearly 1,200 canned goods were raised for this event. 

The winning seminar of the contest received a catered lunch from Carlos O’Kelly’s. The three seminar classes that had the most food donated were Michelle Schrag and Shannon Bartel, Chandler Ochoa and Tony Hein. The winning class was Schrag and Bartel.

When asked what convinced the winning seminar class to start bringing in lots of canned food, teacher of IDD (Intellectual Developmental Disabilities) Michelle Schrag says that the students in her seminar were crazy about the prize and raided their pantries as soon as they saw the reward.

“The contest was a great motivator to teach the kids about giving to the community. It was great to see them bringing in the food knowing that they were helping and to watch their excitement grow,” Schrag said. “My seminar students saw the prize and started bringing in canned food.”

Assistant Principal Blake Smith says that the food drive lets students give back by donating canned goods.

“The Souper Bowl allows our students to give back to Newton. Plus, we have designated 10 different food pantries in people’s front yards where we will put the food. We had more than 1,100 donations, so we can keep them full for a while,” Smith said. “The idea came about through our Sunshine Squad. Ms. Henning and Mr. Rachel in the library were instrumental in collecting and counting the donations.”

Librarian Traci Henning says that the food drive was very helpful to our community because there are many students in need for this food.

“The food drive is helpful because many families in our community have needs [and] the COVID pandemic has made things even worse. Some people have lost jobs, others who do have jobs are struggling to make ends meet. This event gave those who have enough to share an opportunity to do so, and an opportunity for those who could use a little help to get it,” Henning said. “Anyone can leave things in the pantries or pick things up. It’s an anonymous way for people to share with their neighbors.”

Henning and library tech Drew Rachel say that they did not have to recount any of the food because the pair used tallies to mark down the amount of food that came in each day.

“We counted food every time a seminar class brought some down to us, and we kept a running tally. Once items were counted and put on the display, we didn’t recount those, we just counted the new items as they came in,” Henning said.

According to a school-wide survey, over 40% of students said that they donated to the food drive. Students and staff say the food drive shows that the community cares about students who are not as fortunate as others.

“I think the total donations of 1,176 items shows lots of caring! We got everything from protein, canned tuna, chicken, salmon and pork, peanut butter and dry beans, to fruit, vegetables, cereal, pasta, rice just about anything a person could ask for to put a decent meal on the table,” Henning said.