As the Chair of PNWU’s Service and Social Engagement Committee, Cat McCulley recently connected with her colleagues to kickstart a good-natured competition aimed at making a longtime campus resource even more sustainable.
Stocked by faculty and staff, PNWU’s food pantry has been in place since the university’s earliest days, providing shelf-stable food, toiletries, cleaning supplies, paper products and more to members of the PNWU community. “Now that student affairs is taking the pantry over, we wanted to do one last push to get it stocked and do it in a fun, competitive way,” explained McCulley.
Thanks to her efforts, and the ongoing generosity of PNWU staff, faculty and students, multiple teams signed on to a contest put together by the committee, which aimed to fill PNWU’s pantry shelves. In the end, participants donated 2,355 pantry-eligible items, resulting in stuffed campus cabinets and, hopefully, a big community impact.
“Responsibly goes further than providing a quality education,” said Thomas Scandalis, Dean of PNWU’s College of Osteopathic Medicine. “Not everybody has the financial resources to be even comfortable sometimes, and it’s heartbreaking to think that some of our students or staff may worry about where their next meal is coming from. We have to be holistic about it, the same way we’re training our students to look at patients holistically.”
As it was a contest, the following team donated more individual items than any other, earning the coveted PNWU Food Pantry Drive trophy, and set of winning-team t-shirts, and enough campus bragging rights to require double-bagging:
*DRUMROLL PLEASE*
TEAM H!
- Ann Acob
- Lisa Brown
- Deidre Dennis
- Michael Franson
- Vikki Gore
- Lizzie Lamb
- Adam Story
- Brian Vail
- Caitlin Young
“I hope it impacts those who really need it,” explained McCulley. “It’s nice to know that help is there.”
“This is a good start,” added Dr. Scandalis, “and something we should keep at the front of our mind going forward.”
You do not need to sign up for pantry access; if you are in need, simply visit one of the four locations on campus, which are accessible to the PNWU campus community 24/7.