From Nov. 9 through Nov. 16, the Class of 2023 held a food drive for the Westford Food Pantry, bringing in hundreds of cans in the process for Westford residents in need of food. During this time, WA seniors were encouraged to bring non-perishable food items into school to the rooms of class advisors Scott Cruikshank and Amanda Everett, who ran the food drive along with the senior class student government.

To encourage participation, each student’s donations were tracked by their homeroom, and Dunkin’ Donuts gift cards were offered to the class with the most items donated.

“Typically people act when there’s an incentive, so we had hoped that we would get more participation if there was an incentive to participate,” Everett said.

The effort resulted in 450 food items brought in during the event, with social studies teacher Heather Carney’s class winning the prize with a total of 127 cans, with over 90 of them coming from senior Maliha Parikh.

“When you run these food drives, you’re just hoping that people go to their food pantries and grab a couple boxes,” Cruikshank said. “But we had some people donate over 50 items alone.”

Along with Parikh, fellow senior Noah Ablove also recorded over 60 cans for social studies teacher Beth McGregor’s homeroom.

The results of the food drive left both Everett and Cruikshank optimistic about what more the senior class can do to give back to their community.

“I am very appreciative of everyone who donated, and I think we’ve set the bar for ourselves,” Cruikshank said. “If we do any [other] type of community service, hopefully we’ll just keep getting more and more participation”.