Sarnia St. Pat’s students getting ready for Cyclone Aid food drive

Cyclone Aid, an annual community food drive by students St. Patrick’s Catholic high school, is set to collect non-perishable food from neighborhoods across Sarnia on April 1 to help stock shelves at the Inn of the Good Shepherd food bank.

The Easter season food drive was launched in 2002 as a project by the former St. Christopher’s high school and continued after that school was combined with St. Pat’s.

“We are very excited to be back to a traditional in-person model,” said Annabelle Rayson, a student who is co-chairperson of this year’s Cyclone Aid project with Alexa McCloskey.

Last year, the school adapted the event to pandemic restrictions by setting up drop-off locations around the city and collected 1.649 kilograms of food, as well as cash donations.

That total was a sharp drop from the 11,000 kg typically collected before the pandemic.

With the easing of restrictions, students in teams accompanied by volunteer adult drivers will be “going door to door through the city” again this year, Rayson said.

The drive runs from 8 am to noon.

Rayson said it’s helpful if residents can put their food donations in bags or boxes and leave them on their porch or front steps at 8 am for student teams to collect.

McCloskey said organizers have routes set up across Sarnia, including Bright’s Grove.

The food collected will be brought back to the school to be sorted before being trucked over to the Inn of the Good Shepherd.

Rayson said they haven’t set a goal for this year, “but it would be amazing if we achieved what we did with Irish Miracle.”

The Irish Miracle is an annual Christmas-season food drive by the school that collected 28,000 kg of food in 2022.

Cyclone Aid is “a huge tradition,” Rayson said.

“It’s really just a wonderful opportunity for us to come together as students to benefit the greater good of the community, and also have fun and show off our school spirit,” she said.

“Many students really like signing up. and they like going with their friend, and knowing that, even though they’re having a lot of fun, it’s also for the good of others,” McCloskey said.

“They feel like they’re making a difference in the community.”

The Inn of the Good Shepherd said recently more than 1,000 individuals a month are now using its food bank, a significant bump from the about 850 to 900 before the pandemic began.

This weekend is the Inn’s annual Canstruction event at Lambton Mall where 15 teams are scheduled to build sculptures out of cans and boxes of food that will also go the charity’s food bank.

Awards for the best sculptures will be announced Sunday at 1 pm at the mall, and the sculptures will remain there on display until March 21.