This past Tuesday I interviewed Hayley Inglis about an event she organized with Lauren StClaire, called Halloween for Hunger. This even was part of many events organized by the member of the Rotaract club at Quest. The Rotaract club meets twice a month, and there are around 20 students who attend regularly. To encourage student engagement and foster bonds within the group, they host socials twice a month such as a board games night, swimming, and an ice cream sundae party. Some of the other projects they do throughout the year are a match maker fundraiser during Valentine’s Day season, and an ongoing partnership with elementary schools in Squamish to make breakfast for the students.
Organizing Halloween for Hunger started way before Halloween day. The idea is that groups will go trick or treating for non-perishable food items to be donated to the Squamish Helping Hands Society. The goal of the Rotaract team was to get more students involved that are beyond their club. Thus, they made an announcement during community update, set up posters around the Quest community, distributed flyers around the Squamish community, were present during lunch for people to sign-up to go “trick or treating” for non-perishable items, and set up boxes in the cafeteria and partnered with other events on campus to collect items from students. As you can tell by the long list it, was a lot of work!
After students signed-up to join the trick or treating event, the organizers organized groups to go around certain areas of the Highlands area in Squamish on Halloween evening. There were 14 different groups and over 50 people signed up! The groups were encouraged to wear costumes and collect food from 4:30 to 7:30, or until they had completed their area. At the end of the night the groups headed to the Helping Hands and delivered all of the items that they collected.
The event was a success, with massive amounts of non-perishable food items donated to those in need!
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