Towanda Masonic Butler County Kansas

Lyon County, Kansas

Luke Miller, left, and Kyle Barnhart box canned food at Olpe High School Friday morning. The Olpe High students participated in a canned food drive organized by Student Council.

Free day is good incentive for food drive

OLPE — Teachers of Olpe High School were “canned” on Friday. But it’s not what you might think.

Olpe High School students lined up bright and early Friday morning to bring in more than 4,000 cans of food for the Salvation Army’s food pantry. The deal was if the students “canned” each teacher’s classroom, the students would get a free day at school. Brianna Sage, president of the student council, said that when the student council announced this on Monday so students could go out and buy cans, they had no idea the canning would be such a hit. The total number of cans brought in Friday morning was 4,104.

Students filled the halls, stacking cans outside each teacher’s door. Eighteen teachers were canned and it took about 200 cans per door, Sage said. Students quickly realized after cans came crashing down that they had to stack them two deep.

Sage said the idea was born at a student council retreat in November. They decided to add onto the school’s annual can drive. This year, they had a contest with Hartford. Boxes for cans also were placed around the community to be included in that number.

“It all goes toward our competition with Hartford,” Sage said, adding that she was pretty sure they had won the competition.

By 8:30 a.m., students of Olpe High School were reaping the benefits of their early-morning efforts. They were lounging in the gym watching a movie projected onto the wall.

Student council members were busy in another room planning the rest of the day, which included board games, video games and more movies.

After plans were finalized for the day, student council members got straight to work re-boxing and counting the cans. The halls quickly filled with cans and the sounds of cans crashing as they were being counted. Several students groaned and laughed as they lost count.

“We wanted to get all the teachers canned. We really had no idea,” Sage said.

(Emporia Gazette ~ Saturday, 8 Dec 2007)