Package deal: Kids work, and the hungry get food

Saturday, April 12, 2008
RHIANNON THOMAS
THE SAGINAW NEWS
Lutheran students who formed a giant human assembly line say they managed to combine work and fun.

About 700 students and adult volunteers, working in shifts, donned plastic gloves, hair nets and aprons while lining up at eight long tables in Valley Lutheran High School’s gymnasium Friday to measure and scoop dried food into bags, weigh them, seal them and pack them into boxes.

The food will go to hungry children at home and abroad.

”It feels really cool, because you’re helping so many people and at the same time you’re having so much fun,” said Juila J. Bublitz, 11, a fifth-grader at Immanuel Lutheran School in Bay City.

Bublitz, the daughter of Kimberly and Kevin Bublitz of Portsmouth Township, bounced with excitement as she helped seal plastic bags that her schoolmates had filled with a mixture of tofu, rice, vitamins and chicken flavoring and vegetables.

”It’s been a pretty good experience,” said Valley Lutheran senior Jon R. Pickelman, 18. ”It’s nice to see a bunch of grade-schoolers coming in and helping out.”

Pickelman, son of Gene and Lori Pickelman of Freeland, arrived at the school at 8 a.m. to help unload bags of ingredients from trucks and set up for the event.

The goal was to have the students pack 80,000 meals, said Donald E. Burwell, president and chief executive officer of the Great Lakes Coalition of Kids Against Hunger, the New Hope, Minn.-based relief agency that partnered with Thrivent Financial as sponsors.

When boiled with six cups of water, the packaged food makes a chicken flavored soy rice casserole that contains 21 vitamins, Burwell said.

About one-third of the 13.8-ounce meals will go to the Rescue Mission of Saginaw, 1021 Burt, he said.

Kids Against Hunger will save another third at its Michigan Coalition warehouse in Oak Park in case of a natural disaster, and send the final third to developing nations in Africa and South America.

The idea is to ”put a dent in hunger,” said Michael S. Redford, manager of Lutheran community services for Appleton, Wis.-based Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, a not-for-profit organization.

Thrivent is sponsoring several similar events in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana over the next few weeks, Redford said, which they hope will produce 900,000 packaged meals.

Thrivent arranged to hold the event at Valley Lutheran because it is the largest Lutheran school in the region, Redford said. Students from Lutheran schools in Bay and Saginaw counties rode buses to participate.

Other participating schools included St. John Amelith Lutheran School, Bay City; St. Peter Lutheran School, Hemlock; St. Paul Lutheran School, Frankenlust Township; Peace Lutheran School, Saginaw; Faith Lutheran School, Bay City; Grace Lutheran School, Auburn; Trinity Lutheran School, Bay City; Holy Cross Lutheran School, Saginaw; Zion Lutheran School, Auburn; St. Lorenz Lutheran School, Frankenmuth; Bethlehem Lutheran School, Saginaw; and Immanuel Lutheran School of Frankentrost.

Kenny K. Wright, 12, a sixth-grader at Immanuel Lutheran School in Bay City, said the experience made him feel like a hero.

”We’re having such a great time. I feel really happy to feed the hungry. It just feels good,” said Wright, the son of Tammy and Ken Wright of Bay City. v

Rhiannon Thomas is a staff writer for The Saginaw News. You may reach her at 776-9682.

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