STORY BY LAURA KRUG
VIDEO BY YINUO ZHAO
On Saturday, October 19th, over 140 volunteers gathered at Forsyth Library for the SWIPE Out Hunger event, hosted by the Global Leadership Project. The event’s goal is to help feed the hungry by creating food packages to ship to children in need in El Salvador.
The main organizers were Alex Kultgen, who is the student coordinator for the Global Leadership Project, and Jessica Washee, an event leader from Numana, were excited for the outcome of the project.
“Together, we will make 30,000 meals,” Kultgen said. “This will feed 82 children every day for a year with those meals.”
Within two hours, the volunteers had met the goal.
Ten stations were set up with supplies for the volunteers to package the meals in an assembly line setting. Beans and rice were funneled into plastic meal bags and then they were passed down the line and sealed. Once 216 meals were made, they are sealed into boxes that have a personalized message on them.
Skyler Clark was one of the volunteers with Alpha Gamma Delta, and this was her second year helping.
“Being from Kansas we don’t know poverty in the same way, and we are privileged,” Clark said. ”It is great to volunteer and help another country with their needs.”
In conclusion, the project was a great collaboration between several organizations on campus who had the main goal of helping others meet their needs, and gain a better understanding of how to support those in need.