Sebastian Charter Junior High School decided to take action to help our community after reading one of our articles. On February 14, 2022, I posted an article asking Sebastian residents to donate food to the Roseland Ecumenical Food Pantry if they were able due to the large increase of people in need.
Well, Melissa Holman-McClure, a volunteer worker for Sebastian Charter Junior High School, read the article and brought it to the attention of Principal Dodds.
They brainstormed and came up with the idea to do a “dress-down” day at the school to help the Roseland food pantry get more food. They got to dress down for a day in exchange for bringing in canned, boxed, or jarred food.
Since the article, the students slowly started to donate, and this past Tuesday, they were rewarded with their dress-down day. The students were happy not to have to wear their school uniform for one day.
The Sebastian Police Department’s Community Oriented Policing Endeavor Unit, with Sergeant Finnegan and Officer Donald Hart, assisted volunteer Melissa Holman-McClure, and the school’s I.T. coordinator, Chuck Krivan, in delivering the food to the Roseland Ecumenical Food Pantry.
“The volunteers at the food pantry were extremely grateful and surprised at the same time. When asked how they found out the pantry was in need, we told them they learned of their need through the Sebastian Daily news article. They were very happy to hear that and repeatedly thanked us,” Sergeant Finnegan told Sebastian Daily.
