Students work to stuff buses this holiday season
Cache Valley’s Sub for Santa is working with the USU Service Center on this year’s Stuff a Bus donation drive, an annual event.
Each year, the Service Center uses the “Stuff a Bus” motto to gather donations for Sub for Santa. These donations include food, money, clothes and toys that go to underprivileged families in Cache Valley. Service Center Vice President German Ellsworth said the program started as “a way to engage the Utah State community.”
An event currently going on this week is the Penny War, which ends this Friday.
“The main Penny War is between colleges to see which college gets the most money donated,” Ellsworth said. “We’re also winning between living communities, and Greek houses and club sports.”
This widespread competition is one way the program is trying to reach out to USU students, Ellsworth said. The rules of the Penny War are simple, he said. Pennies are worth one point and anything else is worth negative points, and that way students want to put pennies in their jar and everything else in their opponents’ jar. He also said the jars are located around campus in the various living communities. The group that collects the most pennies will not go away empty-handed.
“We’re giving out trophies for Penny Wars winners at the basketball game,” Ellsworth said. “We’re also having a pre-game party at the south end of the Spectrum, Saturday afternoon starting at 4:30.”
One way the program engages the community is through using actual buses or the Aggie Shuttle, he said.
During what are called Neighborhood Roundups, Aggie Shuttles are stuffed with students who traveled to various businesses to collect donations, Ellsworth said. Various clubs on campus also have their own days to go and collect donations. Ellsworth said Aggie Shuttles will be at the Book Table and Wal-Mart on Friday. On Saturday they will be at Lee’s Marketplace, Wal-Mart, Kmart and Sam’s Club.
“We ask people to go there to either donate money for us or to buy an extra can of food,” Ellsworth said.
Another on-campus donation recruiting event will be Dec. 3-5 on the Taggart Student Center patio. Posters located around campus also describe all the upcoming Stuff a Bus events.
When reflecting on last year’s program, Ellsworth said, “Last year was the best year to date: $8,200, 8,000 pounds of food and $4,400 worth of toys.”
According to current tallies, Ellsworth said he believes they will surpass last year’s success.
“This year … Stuff a Bus has already collected hundreds of dollars, 5,500 pounds of food,” Ellsworth said. “We haven’t even hit halfway in the program.”
With several events still to come, Ellsworth said he encourages students to get involved.
“Come, donate,” he said. “Come have fun if you want to help us volunteer.”
-liz.w@aggiemail.usu.edu