Scott Alquist and the Annual Holiday Food Drive
Truckee Meadows Community College has participated in the annual “Share Your Christmas” food drive for 13 years. The drive continues through Thursday, Dec. 17.
“TMCC received a challenge to participate in 2003 to see who could collect the most donations,” said Scott Alquist, Program Manager of the Safety Center at TMCC. “When I passed it on to the President, I was asked if I would spearhead our efforts.”
Donation barrels are available at four of the TMCC campus sites: Dandini Campus, the Applied Technology Center, William N. Pennington Health Science Center and Meadowood Center.
This annual food drive helps families who might not have the means to make their holidays special.
“More than one in five children (in the U.S.) are at risk of hunger,” according to the Peace and Justice Center.
TMCC’s Alquist has been a driving force in this year’s food drive...literally.
To make it easy for staff and students to donate food—which can sometimes amount to bags of heavy cans—Alquist collected contributions on Nov. 26 in the parking lot of the Dandini campus. “Drive-by and Drop-off” was held by the Sierra Building flagpoles where cans could be placed directly into Alquist’s truck instead of having to be carried inside to the collection bins.
He is also gathering monetary donations of checks made out to the Food Bank of Northern Nevada. Any additional checks should be sent to his office at Edison 102 in the Applied Technology Center.
“I’m soliciting donations whenever I can,” Alquist said. “I feel it is very important and I enjoy it immensely – helping people is just the right thing to do. I have been blessed with a great job here at TMCC and am a firm believer in paying it forward.”
For more information about the food drive, please contact Alquist at 775-857-4958.
Helping Creatures Great and Small – Kellie Carter, Meredith Standish and the Scnavta
Kellie Carter is a Veterinary Technician Program instructor at TMCC. She is also faculty advisor for the Student Chapter of National Association of Veterinary Technicians in America (SCNAVTA).
The new student veterinary club is open to all students, not only those enrolled in the Veterinary Technician Program, Carter said.
Carter and Meredith Standish, student president of the SCNAVTA, have been leading a sweater and blanket drive to benefit the region’s shelter animals. The students are working with shelters and rescue groups to find out what they need, trying to benefit small animals with the blankets and other items.
The club is collecting coats and blankets to help keep animals warm during winter, where enclosures many times have concrete floors.
“Dog-size sweaters are great, but if someone donates a human size sweatshirt, we can turn that into a dog-size one,” she said.
Any time before the holidays, gently used items can be dropped off at the William N. Pennington Health Science Center, room 102. For more information, please contact Carter at 775-850-4006.