Varsity club holds successful toy drive
The Presque Isle High School Varsity Club recently delivered over 700 new toys to the United Way of Aroostook office in Presque Isle to go toward the agency’s Santa’s Sleigh Project.
Twenty-seven students and club advisor Laura Hunter transported the toys from the high school Dec. 11, 2015.
“The United Way is especially grateful for the toys that the students provided. With the generosity of the students at Presque Isle High School, we were able to provide an additional toy to almost every child on our list,” said Sherry Locke, executive director of the United Way of Aroostook. “The generosity and Christmas spirit shown by the students is just amazing. It is so nice to see kids helping other kids, especially this time of year.”
Toys were collected for two weeks in homerooms at the school. The Varsity Club decided to make it a competition this year in hopes to bring in more toys, and according to Hunter, it seemed to work really well and kids seemed to get quite competitive.
“On Thursday (Dec. 10), an announcement was made stating that the school had brought in 300-plus toys,” Hunter said. “We announced which homerooms were in the lead in hopes to have one final push for toys. The next day, we counted 710 toys!”
The winning homerooms at each grade level are as follows: grade 9: Madame Dubois; grade 10: Mr. Powers; grade 11: Mrs. Hunter; and grade 12: Mrs. Powers.
Winning homerooms were promised donuts and juice one morning.
“I am so pleased with the success of this toy drive,” Hunter said. “We wanted to make it bigger this year and have a bigger impact on our community. I feel we were very successful.”
