On the week of November 16th-20th, Peninsula’s own Distributive Education Clubs of America (DECA) marketing class is organizing a food drive for the Food Backpacks 4 Kids Peninsula Community Foundation. The food drive is organized by junior Madison Ormsby, junior Nadira Ali, and senior Sara Undem, will be accepting any non-perishable food items possible to reach the goal of collecting 1000 pounds of food items.

“I’ve seen the organization kind of grow in the past six months because we have been doing a lot of things to make it successful,” said Undem.

Last school year, a senior of class of 2015, Tori Denton, was accompanied by Ormsby to run a backpack drive for Food Backpacks 4 Kids, calling students to “Give Back your Packs”. This fundraiser collected about fifty thoroughly and lightly-used backpacks at the end of the school year. The backpacks were ultimately used to hold food distributed to less fortunate children.

“Our collaboration with Food Backpacks 4 Kids started last spring when the students met with the board of directors for the Food Backpacks for Kids organization. Some of the DECA students walked in the Maritime Parade last year and handed out fliers for the Food Backpacks 4 Kids,” said teacher and DECA faculty advisor, John Selfors.

Usually, fundraisers like Food Backpacks 4 Kids are transformed into competitions between classes, plotting the seniors against the juniors and the sophomores against the freshmen. This year, however,  Ormsby, Ali, and Undem are incorporating Peninsula’s competitive nature against the Gig Harbor High School Tides to motivate participation. The food drive is being turned into a district-wide competition, with both high schools accepting donations from the “feeder” elementary and middle schools nearby.

“People don’t understand how lucky we are. A lot of us are fortunate to be where we are and to not have to worry about food,” said Ormsby. “Some kids aren’t as lucky.”

Food Backpacks 4 Kids, which launched on the Key Peninsula in 2009, originally held the general goal of maintaining and meeting nutritional needs in our community’s schools. The organization still holds this goal and ensures that Peninsula School District students who need food on weekends have access to nutritious food items.

“There are kids that can’t provide for themselves, their parents can’t provide for themselves, and there are also kids who are so embarrassed about it,” said Ormsby. “They don’t accept the backpacks, which is a real problem because they need that food. We need to make it a bigger deal.”