This Thanksgiving, Queen Creek High School is providing meals for more than 150 families and donating more than $2,500 in grocery store gift cards to those in need through its inaugural Winner, Winner Turkey Dinner Drive.
Volunteers from the boys varsity basketball team, link crew and student council at Queen Creek High collected food and donations through the event organized by Taylor Pena, physical education teacher and coach of the varsity girls golf team.
"We came up with this idea for the Winner, Winner Turkey Dinner Drive from seeing it work out well with other high schools in the Valley," Pena said. "This drive helps provide an entire meal, as opposed to just your normal canned food drive. We see how much bigger Queen Creek is getting, so the need for these type of events is essential to help out families within our Queen Creek Unified School District (QCUSD) community."
Pena said they were delighted with the results of the food drive, especially since it was their first-ever Winner, Winner Turkey Dinner Drive. He said it took the entire high school to make the event a success and one they hope to do annually.
"Queen Creek High School was able to help provide over 150 Thanksgiving meals, and over $2,500 in grocery store gift cards," Pena said. "This wouldn’t have been possible without our amazing teachers, students and their parents here at the high school.
"This is the first year Queen Creek High has done this event," he continued. "I also had help from Amenda Gamboa (Spanish teacher), Renee Regoli (athletic director), Maria Silva (QCUSD Family Resource coordinator) and many other teachers from the high school."
