Four years after Chimacum school students started their own club for the We international charity network, they’re set to be honored at this year’s “We Day” in Seattle. They’re receiving the accolades for thinking outside the box by urging their classmates to pitch in to the box.

Chimacum High School hosted a documentary film crew April 11-12, to record the We Act Club’s activities, most notably the students filling up their “Food For All” box.

Piper Diehl, parent of a Chimacum We Act Club member, said the students were seeking to fulfill the larger group’s imperative to act both globally and locally in addressing the widespread problem of food insecurity by doing what they could to alleviate it among their peers.

“Forty percent of the students at Chimacum High School are on free or reduced lunch,” Diehl said. “That’s 50 percent throughout the school district as a whole. And the problem with high school students is that they don’t always speak up when they’re hungry, because they don’t want to be singled out.”

The Food For All box is designed to meet the needs of hungry students who don’t want to be stigmatized; as soon as the box is filled each day, everyone is welcome to grab a bite.

GRAB OR DROP OFF

“Right before basketball practice, you can get a quick snack, or drop off a granola bar for someone else,” said Kyle Tenny, a Chimacum High School freshman who joined the We Act Club in middle school two years ago. “And to supplement those donations, we keep a locked pantry, in one of the teachers’ rooms, that we also use to fill up the box.”

Diehl also sees the Food For All box as a means of reducing the waste of nonperishable foods, when kids don’t feel like finishing up the remaining servings of food.

“This box gets filled up before lunch every school day, and it empties out as fast as it’s filled,” Diehl said. “Free the Children [now known as We Charity], the organization we’re part of, liked that our kids came up with a unique response to a nationwide problem, so they sent a film crew here to record what’s going on. Our students will get to see themselves on screen at We Day in Seattle.”

Sammy Raines, a Chimacum High School senior, estimates she and her fellow club members spend at least a couple of hours each week on the Food For All box and other similar community-centric ventures.

“The idea is to give back to the community, and it’s great when I can give back to the kids around me,” Raines said. “There’s not a ton of places you can volunteer for other kids specifically.”

WE DAY IS APRIL 21

Raines cited the Chimacum We Act Club’s donation drives for the food bank, as well as the collection conducted during a football game against Port Townsend, as other ways the group sought to combat hunger in general. More recently, she took pride in being able to dispense bags of food for homeless teens at The Boiler Room and other locations.

We Day returns to KeyArena in Seattle April 21, and the Chimacum We Act Club will be part of it.