Members of Attica Middle School’s Future Farmers of America chapter traveled to the Community Action for Wyoming County’s Cornerstone Building in Perry Monday morning to help make the season just a little brighter for those in need.
FFA members have been collecting items to donate to the non-profit since mid-November, said Susie Baker, a fifth grade special education teacher at Attica Middle School who also serves as FFA advisor. They traveled to Perry Monday to drop off the games, toys, books and clothes they'd collected over the past few weeks for the non-profit's Christmas giveaway program.
After unloading the items, FFA members got to work organizing all of the other donations that’ve been pouring into the non-profit from individuals, businesses, churches, government agencies and community groups in recent weeks. The items will soon be distributed during a few shopping days, when those in need will come to the building and select presents for their children as part of the program.
The program has probably been going on for “15 years or more,” estimated Dee Youngers, a program assistant with Community Action for Wyoming County’s Angel Action Division who runs the program.
Parents come to the building and shop for the children, Youngers explained. Each year, the non-profit usually helps provide Christmas gifts to somewhere between 600 and 700 children in need, she said.
“They’ll get anywhere from five to seven toys apiece, or giftables apiece. They’ll get stocking stuffers and other things also,” Youngers said. “To us, it's rewarding to just see the community pitch in. That’s the neat part about it - everybody pitches in. This is about the kids. This is about knowing the kids will be blessed on Christmas morning with surprises under the tree.”
Middle school FFA members who volunteered at the Community Action for Wyoming County Monday were seventh graders Will King, Laueryn Wescott and Olivia Koch and eighth graders Beau Hyman and Dylan Mirrione.
In addition to members of the middle school’s FFA chapter, members of Attica’s National Junior Honor Society helped organize donated items at the Cornerstone Building on Dec. 9.
Attica Middle School FFA members Will King, Lauryn Wescott, Olivia Koch, Beau Hyman and Dylan Mirrione and their advisor, Susie Baker, volunteered at the Community Action for Wyoming County’s Cornerstone Building in Perry Monday where they helped organize items donated for the non-profit’s annual Christmas giveaway program for families in need.