News

ASB Philanthropy hosts annual Canned Food Drive

Isabel Ji, Staff Writer • November 20, 2024

Food cans from students in Yanire Cercet-Martinez’s fifth period class pile in a corner of the classroom. A total of 689 cans were collected schoolwide through the annual Canned Food Drive.

The annual Canned Food Drive, organized by the Associated Student Body, took place from Nov. 8 to 15. Period five classes competed for the most number of cans, with the winner being Cercet-Martinez’s class with 132 cans. The class earned a Crumbl Cookies party as the prize.

Campus wide, 689 cans were collected, all of which were counted and donated to the San Diego Food Bank yesterday.

ASB Philanthropy commissioners, Corinne Gilkey (11) and Henri Tanghe (11), took lead in this project, and reflected on the significance of the drive as a whole.

“I think it’s a great connector,” Tanghe said. “We as a high school play a pretty important role with people all across the county and district. The [canned food] drive is a way to say that we are here and excited to give back. [It’s great] seeing people across different grades pitching in and the difference that we make when we come together.”

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According to Tanghe and Gilkey, the “long hailed Torrey Pines tradition” usually hauls 600 to 700 cans annually, filled with preserved foods from dried vegetables to baby formula.

Jennifer Ryan, ASB adviser, Leadership and English 9 teacher at the school, commented on the process of planning a variety of events including drives.

“It’s easy to run [events] through ASB because we have a class, we have time to plan, and the processes are already in place for advertising and reaching out to staff members,” Ryan said. “It makes the event and process a bit easier to run. We also have great ASB members who run ASB so efficiently, they are responsible and take care of most of the details for specific events.”

As a whole, ASB Philanthropy strives to support both the school and community. Other fundraiser events they organize include the Torrey Pines Blanket Drive, Toys for Tots and the Torrey Pines Annual Fall Blood Drive. ASB members build communities through volunteering — recently visiting senior homes to help with gardening, making sandwiches for shelters and more.

“I think it’s important to give back to the community because they do so much for the school and our ASB especially,” Gilkey said. “It’s nice to give back to San Diego.”

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About the Contributors

Isabel Ji, Writer

Sitting in cafes and sipping on matcha lattes is a common environment to see Isabel Ji, a sophomore at TPHS and a first-time Falconer staff writer. Outside of the Falconer, Ji loves to play volleyball, draw and cook food from a variety of cuisines for her family — especially Chinese. She moves throughout her day with a growing imagination, expectation for the future, and sweet tooth for ice cream. Ji looks forward to growing as a writer, artist and social media manager. Passions of hers includes expressing her creativity through managing social media for DECA, a business club, Psychology club and Roboctopi, a robotics team. Ji loves music of all kinds from rap to indie, including Mac Miller, Dominic Fike and Malcom Todd. She is always ready to learn new things and work through any challenges she comes across.

April Kato, News Editor

In the same way her 13-year piano journey crescendo towards a finale, April Kato is intent on making her last year as a falcon and a staff on the Falconer a balance of memorable, accent-like events and legato-like relaxed moments. Joining the Falconer her junior year and being inspired by the wonderful community, Kato furthered her love for journalism by securing a position as news editor her senior year. This year, she hopes to take on more stories than she did last year, as her goal is time management and fighting the urge of procrastinating, all of which she fell captive to junior year. Outside of the newsroom, Kato enjoys quiet moments of reading at home and playing classical and modern music on her piano, a treasure passed down from her mother. On the weekends, she can be seen volunteering at a Japanese language school, drafting editorials for her internship at a local community journal or roaming Barnes & Noble. Throughout the years in high school Kato's interest for international relations and global topics has grown, linking to her hopes of pursuing such fields after graduation.