The spirit of giving has infected the Interpersonal Skills students, who recently hosted a pancake feed at Longhorn Steakhouse to raise money to buy gifts for infants and children whose parents are training at the Flint Hills Job Corps Center.

A requirement of the IPS class is for mentor students to give back to the community with service hours. They have also organized events such as working at all of the home football and basketball games.

“I volunteered to raise money at the pancake feed and then we all chose to go and give the gifts after wrapping them together,” senior Josie Hilgers said, “and it was a really fun experience.”

After raising money at Longhorn Steakhouse each student got assigned a kid and they were given a budget of $75 to purchase gifts for the children. Ironically, some students who participated in the event ran into the problem of not being able to find enough gifts to use all of their budget.

After the students were finished purchasing the gifts, they were allowed to personally wrap them and then the following week they were able to bring them to Job Corps. They watched as several children opened up the many gifts that they had bought them.

“[Watching the kids open the presents] almost made me cry,” senior Chrissy Carr said. “It was super fun, just seeing the look on the kids face and their parents face and it’s just something that I will hold in my heart forever. I know that’s something that a lot of people can take away from this event. It was just enjoyable to watch them open gifts that you took time to buy and wrap and the kids enjoyed it too.”

Despite it being a requirement, this was not the only reason students participated in the event.

“It was really good,” Hilgers said. “It was fun to raise a lot of money and then be able to give it back to the community to people who actually need it more than us. I enjoy volunteering; I had a good time.”