An excited group of service-minded Junior ROTC cadets delivered an impressive haul of non-perishable food Monday to Killeen ISD’s Homeless Awareness and Response Program in time for the upcoming spring break.
Killeen High School Roo Battalion senior instructor Keith Bonner praised his students for quickly putting the first-time service project in place. Their efforts yielded more than 1,200 donated items.
The cans and boxes of vegetables, pasta and other goods will help fill 127 food boxes to supplement groceries for families while students are away from school during spring break March 17 to 21.
In addition to helping the community, students got experience running a drive, making posters and announcements and generally rallying interest among students and staff members and in their own churches and other organizations.
“We’re providing food to help families have food for a week or so,” said Dayshanea Wright, a senior.
“We pressed it and eventually everyone started donating,” she said. “I feel proud because I know I’m helping someone going through something. This is our service learning for the year. It helps the community and motivates others.”
Natalie Gomez, a senior, said she was impressed with the generosity of her school and battalion.
“We have more than what we could have hoped for,” she said. “We want to help students who might need food over spring break. We wanted to help our community.”
Service, said Gomez, is one of the most important parts of JROTC. “I think we all enjoy this. I didn’t realize we had this much. This is really cool.”
“We realized a lot of our students at Killeen High School are part of this program and we wanted to give back to the community,” said Jada Masao, a junior.
“We had so much fun. We hung posters and advocated for this. Some of us reached out to our churches. I’m excited for these families to have the food they need.
“It makes me feel proud of our JROTC. We did this quickly and pushed it out. You could see a bunch of bonding within the program to help other families.”
