With so many Santiam Canyon families reeling from this year’s challenges, Stayton and Regis high schools joined together to host a combined Holiday Share from Dec. 2 to Dec. 16.
“We had families in need from our school anonymously request gift items, and then we organized these items into an online wish list,” said Mya Joyce, SHS associate student body president, who kickstarted and organized the event. “People could either purchase directly from the Amazon wish list and have the items shipped directly to us, or they could use the list as a guide for local shopping, to support small businesses if they wished.
“We also accepted items at the Regis main office, taking not only gift items, but non-perishable food, new toys, new clothes which are being distributed to families that can use the donated items,” she added. “Additionally, we were so surprised and grateful to receive generous monetary donations from businesses in the community, which we put towards filling any remaining requests.”
The Holiday Share was open to anyone in the community to participate, she said.
“We advertised it everywhere we could think of!” she added. “We were so thankful for the help in that sense from the North Santiam School District, Stayton Boosters, and of course, our very own high school pages.”
In a typical year, Joyce said students held an annual Food Drive, along with an event called the Giving Tree.
“Through the food drive, our school is one of the largest contributors to our local food bank,” Joyce said. “The Giving Tree is where families at our school anonymously submit requests for gifts that will help them out during the holidays. Unfortunately, neither of these events were possible, in the manner that we are used to, this year. We decided to combine the events and partner with Regis High School to still try and support our community during the holidays.
“We had to completely invent the event, essentially starting from scratch,” she added. “We had gifts mailed to us or dropped off in a contactless manner to accommodate for the COVID challenge.”
Joyce said the drive was more focused on items that families needed to help make their holidays “a little sweeter.”
“There were many, many items requested, and we were so excited by the incredible community support we saw!” she said. “Most of the gift requests were fulfilled by community members, with just a small amount to be filled afterward. The generosity of our community continues to amaze me, over and over again. The collected items are going to families at our school, with any additional donated items going to the wildfire relief efforts at Anthony Hall or our local food bank.”
The feedback Joyce has received has been overwhelmingly positive, she said.
“The community is so glad that the high schools are working together,” she said. “As I keep saying, during this year especially, it is so important that we work together! I think that a lot of people were really glad for another way to help people during this year that has been so hard on so many.”
Regis High students also held a bottle collection as well as participating in the food drive. The Oct. 7 event was a fundraiser for the Santiam Canyon Wildfire Relief Fund, set up by the Santiam Service Integration team of Santiam Hospital.
A total of $10,000 was raised between collecting cans ($8,822.80) and cash donations ($1,177.20).
Nancy Stuckart, whose daughter, Peyton, is a sophomore at Regis, came up with the concept. Stuckart and her husband, Tim, have provided countless volunteer hours at the SCWRF store at Anthony Hall in Sublimity.
Stuckart thought Cans for the Canyon would be a great opportunity for the Regis community to help friends and neighbors. More than 50 Regis students, staff and parent volunteer sorted, bagged and stacked some 90,000 cans and bottles.
Key members included: Nikki and Derek Schumaker who donated the use of a 35-foot long-haul trailer; Sublimity Mayor Jim Kingsbury who organized and transported the cans to the Bottle Drop in Eugene; Ken and Janna Adams, organization, set-up and transportation; Jacob Adams, transport to Bottle Drop; Ron Gower, signage; Richard Van Cauteren, bottle collection; and Stuckart, organization and “expert bottle sorter.”
