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Penny Drive raises big $$

The penny drive initiated locally by Gabriela Willick and Kaylee Walstrom ended successfully, with $1,209.06 in pennies raised.
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Kaylee Walstrom (left) and Gabriela Willick board the bus with some donated food items.

The penny drive initiated locally by Gabriela Willick and Kaylee Walstrom ended successfully, with $1,209.06 in pennies raised.

The effort was community-wide, with students at every school collecting pennies for the drive, and elementary school classes competing within their schools to collect the most and win a pizza lunch.

Mrs. Mackenzie's class at Sowchea Elementary collected the most pennies at Sowchea for the penny drive, with 120 pounds of pennies in total!

The school collected 359 pounds of pennies in all for the cause of clean water projects in developing countries, with $25 buying clean water for life for one person according to the Free the Children Foundation.

Mrs. Repko's class at David Hoy collected the most pennies by leaps and bounds in their school for the drive, but the pennies were not counted or weighed, but according to the administration, they were a clear winner.

Mr. Mulroy's Grade 2/3 class at Nak'albun collected the most in their school for the pizza lunch win, with 20,191 grams in total.

The lunches were sponsored by Newland Enterprises.

Walstrom and Willick began the local penny drive with the goal being to "make Fort St. James penniless" and while more came in after the counting was done, the next batch will be taken in sometime this spring, and Fort could be far ahead of the curve in terms of dropping the penny.

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