Coins for Turkeys is an annual fund drive held every December at the Blackfoot Heritage Sixth Grade school. This year, it was held from December 2nd through December 17th. The school has been doing this drive since the early 1990s, and the kids love it.
The Coins for Turkeys drive raises money for the Blackfoot Community Pantry. Each year, the sixth grade raises money to buy turkeys for holiday food boxes that are given out to the members of our community who are in need.
This year, the pantry asked for 250 turkeys, while they have been donating 150 turkeys for the last seven years. They donated the 250 turkeys, with an additional 3, wrote a check for $17,626.29, and gave it to the community pantry.
This fundraiser is something that the Blackfoot community loves. Colin Folsom, the principal of the Heritage sixth grade, stated, “This is a fun activity that I look forward to every year. We are a very competitive school and each year we try to raise more money than the previous year.” Many local businesses make donations and we even had one student who played her violin in front of Keslers and she raised around $150 on her own.
They involve the kids, and the faculty as well by giving prizes to classes that raise the most money such as a pizza party for the class that raised the most, and the top five classes get a nacho party, while the entire school earns a “snow day”. The competition includes teachers getting to sabotage other classes and daily turkey trots with the leading class gobbling up and down the halls.
