By David Hurtado
Bells are ringing, children are singing, but it’s not quite Kriss Kringle’s big scene just yet. In the meantime, Student Senate’s JCCC Gives drive has been working to help the less fortunate members of the college community.
JCCC Gives is a charity drive Student Senate hosts each year which runs until Dec. 5. It is geared toward providing aid to students, staff and faculty of the college buckling under financial strain during the holiday season. This year, the drive met the needs of 27 different families.
Mindy Kinnaman, manager of Student Life and Leadership Development, said each year JCCC Gives seeks to help various individuals and families at the college. Kinnaman said some of the requests this year have included groceries, gift cards to places like Walmart and Hy-Vee and winter clothing.
“For everyone who is nominated, at the very least we provide them with a holiday meal, but we’ve never just given a family a holiday meal,” Kinnaman said. “We’re usually meeting their requests at some level, and those requests can be for things such as gift cards to Walmart and Target so they can buy some individualized gifts for their children.”
Kinnaman said the idea for JCCC Gives came back in 2011 from a senator named Charles Ruiz who shared a class with a student who was experiencing financial difficulties. Ruiz and his class all pooled together and provided the student with gifts for the holiday season.
Pleased with the results, Ruiz brought his idea to Student Senate with the idea of expanding it to include every student at the college.
Each fall semester, college students, faculty and staff are invited to nominate individuals who could benefit from donations via JCCC Gives. Once all nominations are in, details of each individual, excluding any identifying information, are compiled onto a slip of paper with a number and put on a tree in the CSI Lounge. People passing by can then take one of the slips and ‘adopt’ that person, making a donation in the form of gift cards, money or presents.
Elliot Rogers, Student Senate president, said the drive generates a variety of requests for individuals and families in need. He said they can range anywhere from a new bed or heater to children’s toys.
“We get a huge variety of things,” Rogers said. “It’s not always a situation of dire need where someone needs a heater to keep their house going or a way to get around. Sometimes, it’s just something small to warm the holidays for somebody.”
However, Student Senate does assess the requests to make sure they are needs and not simply wants. Rogers said requests are reviewed as they come in, making sure they are necessary and fulfilling the purpose of Gives.
“We review requests as they come in,” Rogers said. “The program itself is not that we have to watch it too terribly closely, because if we put something ridiculous up on the tree, people aren’t going to adopt it anyway. There’s a little bit of a fail-safe in that if someone sees something on the tree they aren’t comfortable with, they’re just not going to adopt it.”
“We will have to pay attention when we’re taking just the donations that are given. When Mindy goes out and gets those gifts for those people that haven’t been specifically adopted yet, there will have to be a few judgment calls.”
Rogers also added there have been some e-mails expressing concern in regards to self-nominations, asking if the requests could be validated. He said it’s generally just people wanting to feel secure knowing where their help is going.
“We will not be turning away nominations,” he said. “We might review the way nominations are accepted. There’s been some controversy over self-nominations; we might alter how that’s done, but it’s not like we’re not going to tell people ‘No, you can’t nominate another person.’ That’s not the spirit of the event.”
Veronica Clark, senator, said she took part in JCCC Gives this semester because she likes to help people. Outside of the college, Clark volunteers in The Salvation Army and Angel Tree.
“I like that I got to adopt a child this year,” Clark said. “I can’t afford a ton of things, but giving a little, small thing to someone else and making their holiday season more special is a nice feeling.”
Contact David Hurtado, features editor, at dhurtado@jccc.edu.