University students love Trick or Eat
Published Saturday October 31st, 2009
Emily Bosse is co-ordinator of Trick or Eat, a food drive held annually in Fredericton on Halloween.
She is a third year student at St. Thomas University, majoring in political science and human rights, and has been involved with Trick or Eat for three years.
She recently sat down with reporter Molly Cormier to talk about the event's success and raising awareness about hunger in Fredericton.
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Q: If you weren't doing this, what would be your chosen career?
A: Eventually I would like to do some work for an NGO (non-governmental organization) or an IGO (inter-governmental organization), but I'm going to be a student for many more years because I would like to get my PhD.
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Q: What is Trick or Eat?
A: Trick or Eat is a giant food drive we do every year that involves hundreds of students and staff at St. Thomas University and the University of New Brunswick, faculty, and members of the community.
In three hours we collect as much food as we can for the Fredericton Food Bank and St. Thomas University Food Bank by canvassing neighbourhoods throughout Fredericton.
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Q: How successful has the food drive been in past years?
A: Last year we collected 10 tonnes of food, which is $42,000 worth.
We placed second in the country next to Guelph University, which is pretty impressive considering Guelph had three times as many volunteers as we had. They had 1,000 volunteers and we had 320.
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Q: How do you successfully advertise to students who may be busy with other things?
A: I have a wonderful team of volunteers who work extremely hard to promote Trick Or Eat.
We work hard to have widespread advertising that includes posters, sidewalk chalk and events on campus. Trick or Eat costs about $50 to put on, so we have to rely heavily on word of mouth. Trick Or Eat has also become very well established.
I think students look forward to doing this and community members have been extremely generous in their donations over the years.
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Q: Besides food, Trick or Eat also raises awareness. What's the main issue you want people to be aware of?
A: Trick Or Eat is an effort to draw large amounts of attention to the issue of hunger within our community.
Too often we rely on food banks as the first line of defence against hunger, when they are actually supposed to be a last resort.
So by doing this huge push for non-perishable food items, we hope to raise awareness about the effects hunger can have on a community, as well as the need of the Fredericton Food Bank.
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Q: Why is hunger an issue that students are interested in raising awareness about?
A: I think students in particular as a demographic are closer to the problem than maybe the rest of the community might be.
They certainly have a heightened awareness about how expensive food is, and not necessarily to starve, but to go hungry every once in awhile.
It's an incredibly fun event, and an amazing opportunity for the community to come together. Students look forward to going out into Fredericton and doing something good for the city.
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Q: Has the economic recession effected food supply at food banks?
A: Uses of food banks have remained fairly constant, but use of the community kitchen has gone up.
But at the food bank you can only pick up your groceries at certain times a month, and in the meantime, it's quite possible you could run out of food, especially if you are providing for a family.
Sometimes it's difficult for families to get all the food they need.
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Q: What kind of an effect does Trick or Eat alone have on the Fredericton Food Bank?
A: Last year we were able to provide a two-month supply, which bridged the gap between two heavy times of donation, which are Thanksgiving and Christmas.
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Q: How has the community of Fredericton responded to the food drive?
A: The response from the community has been extremely positive. Often times people are expecting us or remember us from last year. I think, by and large, people are glad to see students out doing something good for the community.
More often than not when students end up in the news, it's something negative, like about partying or couch burnings, so I think people are glad to see that our students care about where they live.
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Q: Can you paint the scene of how everything goes down on the night of Trick or Eat?
A: All of our volunteers gather in costume in order to register.
There is an hour of people milling around in excitement, getting ready and admiring each other's costumes.
We rally the crowd up and students go out cheering to the school buses and off to canvas the neighbourhoods. Then we transport the food into a van and drive it off to the food bank.
Students are always amazed at how much food they've managed to collect in such a short time and are genuinely happy about what they accomplished.
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Q: In what way should people prepare for knocks on their doors from Trick-or-Eaters?
A: Our canvassers will be going around between 6 and 8 p.m. on Saturday night asking for non-perishable food items. If anyone would to make a monetary donation they can go to www.trickoreat.ca and do so.
Molly Cormier will graduate from the St. Thomas University journalism program in May. Q&A appears each Saturday.
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