![\"Food](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/STT-L-IGNATIAN-11EG-02.jpg\")
Food is packed up in boxes for the Great Ignatian Challenge Food Drive in Scranton Preparatory School in Scranton Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2025. (SEAN MCKEAG \/ STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)<\/p>\nA yearly food drive at Scranton Preparatory School met its goal of collecting food for the community and helping families during the Thanksgiving season.<\/p>\n
Students collected a little more than 200,000 pounds of food for this year\u2019s Great Ignatian Challenge, a yearly service project where students and the community collect and distribute food. The challenge, now in its fifth year, began Oct. 24 and ended Tuesday.\n<\/p>\n
Students were challenged this year to collect 200,000 pounds of food; they collected 205,157 pounds. The food is donated to places like the Friends of the Poor and Catherine McCauley Center, the St. Francis of Assisi Kitchen, St. Joseph\u2019s Center and the NEPA Youth Shelter.\n<\/p>\n
Senior Patrick Hazzouri, a member of the challenge committee, was confident the school could surpass the goal. Most of the food was collected by the student body, with the committee creating incentives for students to donate, such as wearing a hoodie with their uniform or a free dress-down day. Other challenges were between grades for who could collect the most food.<\/p>\n
\u201cKids do get really pumped up about it,\u201d senior Rebecca Remedios, the event\u2019s coordinator, said. \u201cDoing these challenges is definitely what gets kids mostly to donate.\u201d<\/p>\n
The challenge received support from local businesses, including the Retro Cafe, Cadden Bros. Moving and Storage, ShopRite of Moosic and Schiff\u2019s Food Service. Rebecca said they are grateful for the support, and getting the word out about the challenge was key.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re just always willing to help, which we are so thankful for,\u201d she said. \u201cIt does help us a lot because the school could only do so much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rebecca said the collection was particularly important as the federal government shutdown and state budget impasse took place while it was underway. She felt people donated more because of those challenges.<\/p>\n
Food is packed up in boxes for the Great Ignatian Challenge Food Drive in Scranton Preparatory School in Scranton Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2025. (SEAN MCKEAG \/ STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople really do realize that there is a serious need for this,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s really something that brings our community together, especially during this Thanksgiving time where families shouldn\u2019t have to worry about not being able to have a Thanksgiving dinner.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senior Addison Ahern, a member of the student organizing committee, commended her classmates for their effort in the drive.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think every single person poured their heart and soul into this,\u201d she said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t really about the competition or the incentives or anything. It\u2019s more about the direct impact we\u2019re making on the community and the families and the people we can feed directly with all the food that we\u2019ve raised.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the five years the challenge has taken place, the amount of food the school aims to collect grows as the need has grown, starting at a little more than 65,000 pounds the first year, said Jeanine Pavuk, the school\u2019s director of annual giving and the challenge\u2019s staff organizer.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal every year is to make sure we meet the need of the community,\u201d she said. \u201cAs that need grows, so does our goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pavluk said the need is greater this year, as in addition to the budgetary challenges on the state and federal levels, the cost of food continues to go up. She admires the students\u2019 work ethic in putting it together.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are here every day convincing their friends, their classmates to help the community,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s really what Prep is built on, being men and women for others.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pavuk said she hopes the drive helps Northeast Pennsylvania families be happy, healthy and thriving this Thanksgiving. She also appreciates that it teaches students how to reach out to the wider community.<\/p>\n
Although the challenge has ended, Pavuk said for the first time, drives will be held throughout the school year. She hopes students will see that the need for food doesn\u2019t end at Thanksgiving.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhatever the community needs per month is what we\u2019ll be looking to raise,\u201d Pavuk said.<\/p>\n
She admires the students for having brought the community together for the challenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey built a community around this food drive of people who didn\u2019t necessarily all go together, and I\u2019m so proud of that,\u201d Pavuk said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A yearly food drive at Scranton Preparatory School met its goal of collecting food for the community and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46371,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[227,201,182,139,28,178,180,179],"class_list":{"0":"post-46370","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scranton","8":"tag-education","9":"tag-lackawanna-county","10":"tag-local-news","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-pennsylvania","13":"tag-scranton","14":"tag-scranton-headlines","15":"tag-scranton-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}