The Canned Food Drive, sponsored by the Muslim Student Association, expanded its boundaries last year to accept donations of not just canned food, but other types of food as well.

The club’s tradition in past years has been to collect only canned food and donate it all to a local charity. Robin Palmer, MSA’s sponsor, became involved with the club last year and realized that there are some students here on campus who would benefit from the collection.

“Last year, when I found out that [the food] really was stuff we could choose what to do with, we decided to make some of the food available to our homeless kids who go to school here,” Palmer said.

So starting last year, when the Food Drive came around, MSA began to request donations of cereal, granola bars, etc. for students on campus in addition to canned food, which they would donate to the Salvation Army.

Palmer explains, “A lot of the kids who need [the food] are kids who come to school and they haven’t had breakfast and they need something to eat while they’re walking on their way to class, or they’re leaving school and they’re catching the city bus to go to their job after school and they need something to eat on the way.”

MSA’s president, senior Hadi Naseredden, was in charge of planning and organizing the Food Drive this year.

“I think it’s a great idea,” he said of donating food to McClintock students.

“We [started doing] that last year so that some of the underprivileged kids at McClintock will be able to have lunch everyday or breakfast,” Naseredden said.

The Bonfire is assisting the Food Drive’s effort by accepting cans in place of money to get in. After MSA organizes all of these donations and the rest of the cans they collect, they will decide which charity to help out.

This year’s Food Drive takes place from Mon., Oct. 13 to Fri., Nov. 7, and students can bring donations to any teacher with a brown paper bag in their classroom that says “MHS Food Drive” until Mon., Nov. 3.