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Alcona 8th Grade students help at food pantry

LINCOLN, Mich. — Alcona County is holding another pop–up pantry tonight, but along with their usual volunteers– there was a different group giving back this time.

Alcona Community School’s 8th graders took over some of the volunteer efforts at the pop–up pantry this week. It’s part of a three-project effort the class is doing to give their time around the community.

“They’ve been very excited to do this,” said Jennie Hoshal, the class’s English-Language Arts teacher. “I think it’s going to have a really good outcome on what they think about.”

The volunteer projects relate to the unit the students are working on in class- “What Matters.”

“I’m hoping that they come away with, ‘This is something that matters,'” Hoshal said. “This is a way to contribute to the people around them.”

One of the students wasn’t new to helping at the pantry, and he says that making people happy is his motivation to give back.

“I’ve done this before,” said Garret, one of the students at the event. “It’s really fun to see everybody come by, pick up the food, and see them happy.”

“I agree with him,” Garret’s classmate Vincent said. “Just making people happy.”

Their classmate, Kylie says giving happiness makes her feel better in the end. “It feels great, actually,” Kylie said. “Hopefully most of my class feels the same way.”

Hoshal says she hopes that these experiences influence her students decisions in the future.

“They’ve done a tremendous job today,” Hoshal says. “I’m proud of them, and [I’m hoping] that they’ll continue to do things like that and make those choices.”