Motown classics drifted down Lakewood Elementary’s yellow, cinder-block hallways from the school’s gymnasium, alive with the shrieks and screams of third graders.
In the middle of the gymnasium, 11 cafeteria tables formed a circle on the hardwood floor. Behind them was a ring of palettes stacked high with cans of corn, boxes of Cheerios and other grocery items. Second-grade teacher Turquoise Parker stood in the center of the food-packing assembly line.
“Welcome to Costco!” she exclaimed as she welcomed friendly faces to the massive food-packing event she organizes twice a year.
It was a Thursday, and after packing 3,334 bags of food the day before, volunteers still had quite a ways to go until the “food raiser” reached its goal: 4,800 grocery bags brimming with food staples.
With Durham Public Schools closed for the holidays, many children who rely on the schools for free breakfast and lunch will miss meals. Parker’s event helps fill that gap, providing a bag of groceries for every student in 12 Durham schools.
The event’s origins go back a decade, when Parker learned of one mom’s need for food for the upcoming holiday break.
“One of the parents in my class…said, ‘I don’t have anything at all, Ms. Parker, like at all…is there any place I can get food for my kids?’”
Upon hearing this, Parker, then a third-grade teacher at Eastway Elementary school, went home and, with her husband, bought the family bags of food and holiday gifts. She didn’t just stop there, though.
“I sent a text message out to as many people as I could think of,” Parker recalls.
In three days, Parker raised enough money to send each of her students home with a gift and a bag filled with groceries for the break. The following year, Parker collected enough food for the entire third grade at Eastway Elementary School.
The food drive expanded each year, and last year Parker’s event raised enough to give every kid at 12 Durham schools a bag of groceries for the holidays.
Each bag contains a very specific set of items: a can of corn, green beans, baked beans, chicken, and tuna, as well as a jar of peanut butter, a bowl of Kraft macaroni and cheese, a package of ramen, a box of Cheerios, a loaf of bread, and some oatmeal, apple sauce, and crackers filled with cheese and peanut butter. The goal is to provide foods that can be easily prepared without access to a full kitchen.
Parker, now a teacher at Lakewood Elementary, carefully explained the process to a new volunteer, Becky Hawkins. Each bag must be packed the same way. This ensures that all the bags fit in the rented U-Hauls parked in the Lakewood Elementary bus pick-up line.
Hawkins was among the many welcome extra hands .Volunteers worked steadily for five straight days, Dec. 3-7, packing, organizing, and dropping off each bag at the 12 schools taking part in the drive.
On day three of the drive, the event had a hard stop at 8 p.m., with packing starting again at 8 a.m. the next morning. Adults and schoolchildren surrounded the circle of gray plastic tables around the gymnasium, each volunteer wheeling a cart or stack of plastic containers with six paper bags each. One by one, they lapped the circle of supplies, placing each item neatly in a bag. Canned items were stacked at the bottom, with Cheerios slotted at the back and a loaf of bread on top.
The Temptations lingered in the air, mixing with the laughter of schoolchildren who vied for Parker’s attention, crying out her name and bombarding her with questions.
“Can I be on peanut butter?” “Where should I go, Ms. Parker?”
“Third graders!” Parker called out as the smiling faces jumped, hopped and slid into a messy circle at hip level around the five-foot-tall teacher. The 2:15 p.m. bell signaled the end of the school day, and the children assembled into a restless line as Parker sent them on their way out of the gym.
“I hope that they see their part in the world,” Parker says of her smaller helpers. “That you don’t have to be out in the front every time….It can be fun helping other people.”
The noise in the gym died as the children left, leaving six adults steadily packing and reorganizing the supplies tables. Band-aids cover the volunteers’ weathered hands as they fill bag after bag.
Hawkins, the newest addition to the group of volunteers,went to Lakewood Elementary 60 years ago.
“I remember all this. I remember coming into lunch in the lunch line and doing lunch there and back that way,” she reminisced, pointing towards the back of what is now the Lakewood Elementary gymnasium. “I feel like I’m home.”
For Parker, the motivation for the event is simple.
“The community is in need,” Parker said. “It’s real out here in these streets and that we need each other.”
Above: Turquoise Parker hands a loaf of bread to a young volunteer at the “food raiser” she organized at Lakewood Elementary School. Volunteers at the event packed 4,800 bags of groceries for local children. Photos by Abigail Bromberger — The 9th Street Journal
