Each Wednesday morning, students from the Life Skills class at San Benito High School volunteer at Community FoodBank. It was a quiet morning recently as two school vans pulled into the parking lot and soon after the smiling faces of students, eager to work, emerged.
Quickly, they went on with their assigned tasks, but not because they “had” to. The energy and enthusiasm they carry is infectious. This day, the students spent their time bagging candy (cookies and cream milkshake malt balls) from Marich Chocolates.
According to Warehouse Manager, Randall Martin, about 400 pounds of candy is bagged in one-and-a-half to two hours.
Ann Vasquez, teacher of this class, said doing activities like this helps the students learn valuable skills as well as feel good because they are helping other people. Upon asking one student, Adam Bell, what his favorite part of coming to FoodBank is, he quickly responded with “helping people.”
This was an enthusiastic consensus among all the students. Make no doubt about it: they are helping other people, but they are also helping all of us – with their commitment, dedication and enthusiasm for life.