Community Service Drives CHASS Holiday Project

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Tis the season to be jolly … especially in service to others.

For the second year, the CHASS dean’s office organized a holiday food drive to support NC State’s Feed the Pack food pantry. Dean Jeff Braden issued a friendly challenge to other deans’ offices and administrative groups around campus to collect food and gift cards.

As an incentive, the dean promised that he and his staff would sing carols when they came to pick up the contributions on December 16. He even rewrote some of the lyrics to drive home the message of giving and of cheer:

We Wish You A Merry Christmas

Now help us to feed the Wolfpack
Now help us to feed the Wolfpack
Now help us to feed the Wolfpack
So we can all have good cheer.

Your food we will take
To the pantry to make
Good tidings for Christmas
And a happy new year.

The participating groups contributed 953 pounds of food, up from 406 pounds the competition garnered in 2012. They also donated $260 in gift cards. Although DASA won the contest by contributing the most food, the CHASS dean’s office felt like winners too as they loaded the food into Assistant Dean Karen Young’s truck and the dean’s van and delivered it to the food pantry.

“We really enjoyed giving back to the Wolfpack community in this way,” says Crissy Williams-Brown, the dean’s executive assistant. “Community service is important, and this was a fun way to get into the holiday spirit while serving others.”

Many thanks to all the groups who joined CHASS to provide for those in need: DASA, the Provost’s Office, and the colleges of Education, Textiles, Poole College of Management and CALS.