Gateway classes to host annual OCC's Pack and Stack

On November 5, The Office of First Year Programs will host the annual Operation Christmas Child (OCC) Pack and Stack. This event will be held in the Paul Dana Walker Arena for the Gateway classes.

The goal of OCC is to collect toys, school supplies and personal items for boys and girls from ages two to 14 and pack them in shoeboxes to be delivered to children all over the world.

Gateway students have collected and built over 47,000 boxes over the past 26 of the Pack and Stack, 

Deke Day and the Pack and Stack are the main events that help gateway students complete their service hours for their first semester. Madalynne Scott, senior youth and family ministry major, has been a gateway peer leader for three years. She explained how Deke day and OCC are both important for freshmen service learning. 

“[The freshmen] have Deke day, just serving the community and I think that's their local service. Then [OCC is] how you can have an impact globally,” Scott said. 

The event will include an address from President Paul Conn and Mrs. Conn, pictures with Santa and Mrs. Clause, a guest speaker from OCC, a Festive Fit costume contest, gateway banner contest, Christmas caroling and milk and cookies.

Basit Hammand will be this year’s guest speaker and OCC representative. When he was 13 years old, he received his first OCC shoebox. This gift inspired him to spread the gospel to isolated parts of the world. He is now training to become a pilot to fulfill this mission.

Lorinda Roberts, vice president of Student Success and Office of First Year programs, appreciates hearing from a recipient of an OCC box because it is a clear testimony of how effective these boxes can be. 

“It becomes a visual encouragement. Then, we show them pictures of [children] who will receive these boxes, and they hear stories about it,” said Roberts.  

“We’re trying to help them catch the vision of what we're doing. As simple as it may be, packing a shoebox [has] great impact on the life of a child.”

After the boxes are constructed and filled, the gateways gather together to stack all the boxes into one pile and pray over the boxes.

“At the end of the night, we're doing a blessing of the boxes. We bring one individual from each class and pray over these boxes before they are distributed around the world,” Roberts said.

This is often a highlight of the night because gateway classes get to see how many boxes they made and pray over the children who receive the boxes.

“It makes me really happy [and] brings tears to my eyes every time I see hundreds upon hundreds of boxes being packed, knowing it is going to have an eternal impact on kids,” Scott said.

While the Pack and Stack event is exclusively for gateway students, all students are welcome to pack a box to support the mission.

“If you want to bring your boxes and stack them with ours, you're welcome to. I would welcome anybody who's packed a box if they want to drop it off that night,” Roberts said.  

Doors will open at 6:30 p.m. and the event will start at 7 p.m.

For more information about getting a box to pack for OCC, visit the Office of First Year Programs in Paul Conn Student Union 304.

For more information about Operation Christmas Child, visit samaritanspurse.org/.