Student volunteers from Dearborn Heights Hillcrest Elementary and Riverside Middle School are helping others and learning to appreciate their own blessings at the Hosanna Food Pantry.
The basic needs pantry, located in the school building of Hosanna Tabor Lutheran Church in Redford Township, currently distributes food from 9 to 10 a.m. the first Saturday of each month, and delivers food to those who are homebound or without transportation in Dearborn Heights and Redford Township.
The student volunteers, who are members of Kiwanis-sponsored K-Kids Club at Hillcrest and the Builders Club at Riverside, invited the people the pantry serves to a community holiday dinner Dec. 16 at the pantry, where they served up nourishment and good cheer.
Lisa Hicks-Clayton, who is a member of the church, is also a Kiwanis club member working with students at Hillcrest and Riverside. When the food pantry needed a new lead volunteer more than a year ago, she decided the position was a good fit for her, as it provides a volunteer opportunity with her church and a chance for the students she works with to volunteer at the pantry.
Hicks-Clayton said her initial goal was to make more potential recipients aware of the food distribution site.
“There were maybe three to five families a month that came to the pantry,” she said. “One of our goals was to really get the word out, because if you are going to do a ministry or service, you want to make sure people know it was available.
“We wanted to break down any of the barriers. It is hard for people to ask for help. You come in, we don’t ask you questions, you don’t have to prove your residency, you don’t have to prove your income verification, nothing like that.”
She said by removing the barriers, they are able to provide support to the community, and now serve about 35 families on site during the monthly distribution. A wind storm last year, during which people lost power and perishable food, led the pantry to start delivering food to those in need, which the pantry has continued.
“We do distributions at senior centers, we partner with Project Dignity and we feed the homeless in Detroit and our numbers are anywhere from 150 to 200 families a month,” Hicks-Clayton said.
Project Dignity is a Dearborn Heights-based organization that helps the homeless in Detroit and beyond.
The food pantry, run by Hosanna Tabor Lutheran, is funded by private donations. It provides basic staples, like canned goods and cereal, that people can use immediately to make a meal, and a few basic toiletry items, like soap, toothpaste and deodorant.
As they promote the pantry to people in need, different groups have approached the pantry to help them by doing food drives to replenish its shelves.
She said the pantry has relationships with groups such as the Salvation Army, who will give them items when they receive donations and have some to share.
The Dec. 16 luncheon that the student volunteers prepared, served and cleaned up for was a first time event for the group to bring down the barriers between the volunteers at the pantry and the recipients.
“I have always been told if you have abundance, if you have extra, you build a longer table,” Hicks-Clayton said. “We are going to bring those walls down, those barriers. It’s about relationships with people, and they will come have dinner with us. That was what today was all about.”
Hicks-Clayton said eight students prepared and served the meal to 25 guests from the population served by the pantry, and the students packed food bags for the next Saturday distribution on Jan. 6, as well. The Kiwanis-sponsored student groups are service leadership programs, which meet once a month and do a service project.
“I try to let the kids do as much planning as possible, because it’s about leadership,” Hicks-Clayton said. “We want them to learn how to communicate with each other, how to problem solve, how to work together as a team, and these are life skills that will last them their entire life. They are our future leaders, and we are developing them today.”
She said the students not only cooked, but they also greeted people as they arrived.
“They were so happy and jovial,” Hicks-Clayton said. “It was great. They love it, and the families (recipients) like seeing that.”
Manar Hariri of Dearborn Heights, a Builder Club member at Riverside Middle School, who helped set up the tables and serve the food at the dinner, she was happy she could help serve her community and the less fortunate.
“I enjoy helping other people, and showing the less fortunate that there is always someone willing to help,” Hariri said.
Hicks-Clayton’s daughter Marissa Zamesnik, 14, a freshman at Crestwood High School, who works at the pantry with her mother and was a member of the Builders Club last year at Riverside, said volunteering at the pantry makes her feel happy as well.
“Knowing that I am helping someone else makes me feel better about everything in general,” Zamesnik said. “It makes me feel glad and happy, and proud that I am able to help all these people.”
She said volunteering is character-building for students, which is important.
“It helps build up certain characteristics, and leadership is certainly one of them,” Zamesnik said. “And also compassion. I think it really helps someone mature.”
The students also prepared gift bags for the homeless Dec. 22. The bags will be distributed Christmas Eve at the Tumaini Center, a 24-hour homeless shelter in Detroit operated by the Neighborhood Service Organization.
The students will also participate in a service project making dog and cat toys for the Friends for Animals of Metro Detroit, based in Dearborn.
For more information about the food pantry or Kiwanis-sponsored youth leadership programs at Riverside and Hillcrest schools in Dearborn Heights, contact Hicks-Clayton at 313-348-9848 or at hicksclaytonlisa@yahoo.com.
