The Ag Academy students held and supervised a food packing event on November 30. Ag Academy wanted to help the sustainability of another country by teaming with Numana to package meals. The meals included dried pinto beans, soy beans, and rice. Around 10,400 meals were sent out to El Salvador exceeding the goal of 10,000. Before the event the students in charge raised $3,000 by selling pork chops at home football games to be able to purchase the supplies. They also presented to the Newton Chamber of Commerce who voted to come volunteer at the event as well.

Volunteers included students, teachers, and community members. Over 100 people came to help package the meals. None of the volunteers were required to be there. Many people enjoyed getting to help other people have a meal for Christmas.

“I feel like it’s a great cause because there’s a lot of kids around the world that don’t have the opportunity to have healthy meals like us.” junior Cody Stassen said.

“I really think it’s cool to help people in another country, it’s good to know people will get food from us” senior Dylan Vajnar said.

The meals were packed during the end of seventh hour and all of seminar. The Ag Academy students were in charge of teaching volunteers how to package the meals and making sure everything was going smooth, they wore green matching shirts to help stand out. The Ag Academy students were very thankful for all of the help they received.

“I was very glad to see the turnout. We were able to meet and exceed our goal of 10,000 meals. We have been preparing for this event for quite awhile and i’m glad it turned out the way it did. Some people would think if you gave the choice to volunteer you wouldn’t get the turnout you had hoped for but that definitely wasn’t true about this event. We had so many volunteers that we had to rotate different tables to accommodate everyone.” sophomore Ag Academy student Elijah Redington said.