Make a Difference Day at Henley School will feed hungry over many weeks!

Personal Notes from Margaret Gorman, IHS Meal Packet Coordinator   Life Skills class arrives at Big Lots for shopping spree J.T. Henley Middle School in Crozet, Virginia participated in "Make a Difference Day" by making meal packets for IHS. There's not enough room to tell you about all the ways the students participated, but for part of the story you can read a nice article by Bryan McKenzie from the Saturday, Oct. 21 Charlottesville Daily Progress newspaper (link to this article is below). I'd like to add that two girls raised $125 in a bake sale that we used to purchase food.  Harris Teeter Grocery Store in Crozet donated $50 and let us borrow two grocery carts that we are using for collecting donations and for moving food to various classrooms where the students assemble the meals. Students gave up free time to go to Ms. Effland's classroom to make greeting cards. About 20 students helped Margaret Gorman conduct a semi-scientific study to compare the efficiency and accuracy of two methods of assembling meal packets: piecemeal construction vs. the assembly line. The results suggest that Henry Ford had a good idea when he invented the automobile assembly line. Eighth grade students will receive community service credit for their help. Everyone who participated had a good time and knew they were providing valuable assistance to people who are going through a tough time. Two happy shoppers with longest grocery receipt in Big Lots day! I can't tell you enough about how much I appreciate the time and effort the Life Skills class put in to shopping, assembling meals and creating cards. The grocery receipt they produced on their shopping trip to Big Lots was about seven feet long.  One photo shows happy Life Skills class students displaying their large purchase. We want to express great appreciation to the J.T. Henley community for their success in this huge effort. Amy Effland, Amy Hovis and Teresa Goodin organized the effort. Susan Guerrant, Chuck Miller and Kevin Murphy provided great financial support, advise on logistics and publicity. The custodial staff collected nice boxes for packing the meals. The front office fielded questions and collected the donations for us. Maureen Russell gave her art classes the time and resources to produce beautiful greeting cards. Students filled three shopping carts with heaps of IHS food packet products. Enjoy reading the article, and contact us if you'd like to know more about how to participate. The 322 full day meal packets assembled by Henley Middle School is a new one-time assembly project record for an IHS contribution. Thank you Henley! Here is the direct link to the Daily Progress article: http://www2.dailyprogress.com/news/2011/oct/21/mckenzie-henley-goes-big-make-difference-day-ar-1400876/