Doubek students collecting food until Dec. 14
By Tracy Ouellette
Editor
The 5-year-old kindergartners at Doubek Elementary School in East Troy have organized a Stuff the Bus food drive to benefit the East Troy Food Pantry.
The drive is a result of a problem-based learning project the kids began in October.
Teacher Jennifer Ledin said Dan Walsh from the food pantry visited the kindergartners on Oct. 22 and told them the pantry was low on food and in need of donations.
“There’s a problem at the food pantry,” 5-year-old Trapper Stoychoff said. “The shelves are empty and they need more food.”
Ledin said the students went to visit the pantry Oct. 22 after Walsh spoke with them to see for themselves how desperate the need was.
“People need more food to eat,” Sophie Matz, 6, said. “They need baby food and potatoes and vegetables and they need more stuff in the fridge – it was empty.”
After the kids visited the food pantry they returned to the classroom and discussed what the food pantry is and what it does and why people might go there, Ledin said. After that they described what they saw at the food pantry and where they thought the need was the greatest.
The kids next brainstormed ideas on how they could help solve the problem with their teachers. Ledin said the discussion started with ideas about each kid bringing items from home, then moved to getting extended family members to donate, to telling community members about the drive, to asking Piggly Wiggly and Walmart to help.
“One kid said ‘my dad has a semi’ and that led to ‘we could fill a bus.’ Then, they started working on how they could do that,” Ledin said.
“We’re going to try to stuff the whole bus to the top,” Rachel Kuehn, 5, said. “If the bus gets full, we’re going to use another bus.”
The kindergartners wrote a letter to the principals at the other schools in the district, asking for their support.
They said they wanted to complete the project by Christmas and listed suggestions for needed donations, including healthy snacks, canned fruits and vegetables, canned meats, peanut butter, applesauce, rice, pasta, soup, juice, baking mixes, cereal, soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste, toilet paper and paper towels.
The kindergartners also asked if any of the older students in the district would be interested in helping out with their project. This request led to several East Troy High School cabinet members offering their services.
The high schoolers spent time at Doubek last week making promotional posters for the food drive with the kindergartners. After the posters were completed, the kindergartners took a bus ride to local schools and businesses and asked if they could hang up the posters to let the community know about the drive.
“A lot of the people said yes,” Kuehn said. “But some people said no.”
Ledin said only one place the kids visited declined to hang one of their posters.
“The kids were coming out of each place with big smiles and their thumbs raised whenever they dropped off a poster, but this time they came out with thumbs down. It was the only time.”
How to help
The kindergartners are collecting non-perishable food items until Monday, Dec. 14. They plan to “stuff the bus” on Dec. 15.
Community members are invited to bring donations to the collection boxes at Doubek Elementary, Prairie View Elementary, East Troy Middle and/or East Troy High schools.
For more information, call Ledin at (262) 642-6730, ext. 2234.
