The best part was knowing that the food would directly benefit the community, as all of the meals would be distributed within the area to the Salvation Army and Emergency Food Box. Although MCS has participated in meal packing events in the past, this was the first time they had teamed up with all of the other organizations. Ric Anderson, the current Rotary president, said he also attends Men of Faith meetings, and when he heard about the opportunity to be involved, he jumped at it, with one caveat — instead of 5,000 meals as in past years, they would go for 10,000 this time around.

Abie Chadderdon, one of Men of Faith’s approximately 60 members, said the group chose this charitable project over several others and raised the money to make it happen. Members of both groups took time out of their busy schedules to be there in person, put on their hairnets and get to packing.

“There’s just a lot of need in Marshalltown right now, and if you look at this program the Christian School is doing, it’s 35 cents a meal. That’s pretty cheap, so we can give out a lot of meals at a very low cost to do that and that’s what we want to do,” Anderson said.

Chadderdon agreed that there is a great need currently and saw the meal packing as a great way to help. MCS Principal Bethany Wirin said she loved the community involvement and hoped it would inspire the students to be leaders as adults.

MCS students teamed up with members of the Marshalltown Rotary Club and the Men of Faith group to pack meals for local families in need on Tuesday afternoon.

“They can make an impact as a child, but they can also see adults doing it working alongside them,” Wirin said. “That’s a good future ahead.”

Anderson, Chadderdon and Wirin all agreed that packing meals was just fun, and they couldn’t think of a better way to spend their Tuesday afternoons.

“I’ve done it before. You make it a competition and a challenge, and the next group’s coming in. Some of my staff are coming in to help,” Chadderdon said.

By about 2 p.m., the group had already packed over 2,500 meals and was well on its way to reaching the ultimate goal of 10,000.

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Contact Robert Maharry at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.