Photo by James H Loving 2015
Hardywood Brewery played host to the Alumni Charity Challenge last week, an event that began in Richmond three years ago and collects canned food for the charity Feedmore.
The challenge pits universities against each other to see who can bring in the most canned food in a three hour period. There were 27 schools this year and for the first year schools from outside of Virginia were represented, including Clemson University, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and University of Southern California.
VCU was the winner this year, bringing in 2,647 pounds of canned food. The event brought in 12,179 pounds total.
Timmy Nguyen, president of VCU Alumni RVA Gold, said when the event began three years ago there were only seven schools and the event brought in 2,776 pounds of food.
“We started the event because we wanted to get all alum chapters in RVA together to raise awareness on hunger,” Nguyen said.
Photo by James H Loving 2015
The event is held in September because it is hunger awareness month, which was started by Feeding America and seeks to raise funds, support and awareness in hopes of securing change on the governmental level to help further their cause.
Nguyen said the goal for next year is to have 40 schools participate in the food drive.
Governor Terry McAuliffe and Mayor Dwight Jones both issued proclamations recognizing the event and its efforts. U.S. Senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine also commended the event in separate letters.
Photo by James H Loving 2015
Print Managing Editor, Matt Leonard
Matt is a senior print journalism major and political science minor graduating this December. Matt began at the CT as a contributing writer before moving up to staff writer and online news editor. Matt worked at The Denver Post with the web team as a Dow Jones News Fund digital intern last summer, and previously interned with WTVR/CBS6. // Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn