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Ritenour School District’s 2022 Food Drive Tops 11,500 Items for Families & Community

Ritenour families and staff again showed the giving spirit of the holiday season, donating more than 11,500 Items of food during the district’s annual food drive.  

Ritenour Middle School led the way in donations, collecting more than 2,500 food items and $350 in monetary donations. 
RMS

The food was picked up Monday, Nov. 21 and delivered to the Ritenour Co-Care Food Pantry, located at the Ritenour Husky Support Center, 9303 Midland Blvd. The unique food pantry, which offers a grocery store shopping experience, provides free fresh, frozen foods and shelf-stable items to more than 1,800 Ritenour families who experience food insecurity each month. 

The Overland Public Works Department loaded trucks and brought the items to Ritenour Co-Care from nine Ritenour schools. 

School donations included:

  • Buder Elementary collected nearly 200 items. 
  • Iveland Elementary students and staff donated more than 1,600 items.
    Iveland
  • Kratz Elementary collected 1,470 items.
  • Marion Elementary collected nearly 1,000 items.
    Marion
  • Marvin Elementary collected 1,344 items.
  • Wyland Elementary students and staff collected 1,125 food items to be donated directly to their families.
  • Hoech Middle School collected nearly 500 items.
    Hoech
  • Ritenour High School collected a total of nearly 1,100 items.
    RHS
  • The Ritenour School for Early Childhood Education donated nearly 700 items. 

The district’s annual food drive for Ritenour Co-Care started back in 1982, when Ritenour Middle School teacher Ken Crowder started the collection as a class project. That year, the district collected 2,000. Although Crowder has since retired from the district, he continues to be fully vested in the project as president of the Overland Neighborhood Preservation Commission.