ST. LOUIS — High school football season is underway in Missouri and Illinois. Students and staff at two St. Louis area high schools have been competing all week to tackle hunger.
Tackle Hunger III is made possible on 5 On Your Side by Neighbors Credit Union. Officials with Operation Food Search said last year's Tackle Hunger was one of their most successful collection efforts.
The project was well underway Thursday at Pattonville High. Students and staff there have been collecting donated food items all week for Tackle Hunger. Student council members headed-up the project, organizing incentives such as:
- a raffle ticket for one can
- merchandise from the student council store for five cans
- and a possible homecoming ticket in exchange for 10 cans
Pattonville student Olivia Grace said, “I think it's a great way to bring everyone together, especially when we're like giving rewards for bringing the cans in.”
“There is lots of just helping the community,” said student Tailyn Seddens. “We always need to give back to the community, because the community always provides for us.”
Pattonville teacher Sam Markowski was asked what she hopes comes out of the school-wide effort.
“Just as many cans as we can possibly get would be great,” she said, laughing.
Fort Zumwalt-North is the school Pattonville is going up against, in this first round of 2024 Tackle Hunger. At Zumwalt-North, students have also been working all week to collect cans and other non-perishable food items.
Fort Zumwalt-North student Rylee Thomure said, “Building principal, Dr. Entwistle, hit us with the assignment last-minute, so I'm really proud of all the exposure we got and progress we made at school.”
Fellow Zumwalt North student Caylee William added, “I’ve been going to all my classes and telling everybody - bring in your cans; we need to beat Pattonville!”
“We're making it a competition,” said Zumwalt North student Drew Riley. “Everyone loves competition and the more you compete, the more it helps everyone.”
Operation Food Search officials will collect and weigh the barrels they dropped off earlier this week, Friday. Five on Your Side will have the results of the contest Friday night at 10 p.m. on the sports segment “5 On Your Sideline.”
Segments will also air Friday on “Today in St. Louis,” and “Show Me St. Louis.”
While people cannot donate food items at Friday night’s football game, they can drop donations off during business hours at any area Neighbors Credit Union location.
Next week’s Tackle Hunger III competitors are Breese Central and Mater Dei. Those two Illinois schools have agreed to compete all week long and square off on Sept. 6.