Fayetteville — They did it! Fayetteville Elementary School surpassed its goal of collecting 10,000 food items for its annual canned food drive and finished on Dec. 18 with a total of 15,000 items.
School counselor Robert Baker also fulfilled his promise to students that if they collected 10,000 items, he would stand on the school roof Dec. 23 at dismissal time and sing a song of the students’ choosing. The students selected the song “Let It Go” from the Disney movie “Frozen.”
The school set the goal of 10,000 food items in honor of Baker’s 25th year of coordinating the annual food drive, which benefits The Salvation Army of Syracuse and the F-M Community Outreach food pantry. The school typically collects between 4,000 and 5,000 food items for the annual drive. Fayetteville Elementary has about 435 students enrolled in grades kindergarten through four.
On the weekend of Dec. 12, Baker set up “Candy Cane Lane” in front of Wellwood Middle School. He used a generator to inflate holiday and winter decorations and treated anyone who donated a food item to candy canes and hot chocolate. The greater community responded and about 4,500 items were collected that weekend alone, pushing the school past its goal.
Donations continued throughout last week until the drive ended on Friday, Dec. 18.
The food drive is incorporated into the school’s character education program, similar to what takes place in other schools in the district. Students and staff at Enders Road Elementary School recently held a food drive for the F-M food pantry and collected 876 pounds of food and toiletries. Eagle Hill Middle School students have a goal of collecting 1,000 cans during its February food drive to benefit the F-M food pantry, and at Mott Road Elementary School, second-grade students also recently collected food for the F-M pantry. The students decorated 30 paper grocery bags as turkeys that they filled with the more than 300 food items they collected. The school also held a food drive for The Salvation Army.
