Lilly Zaks

News Editor 

A new project is underway amid the halls at R.J. Reynolds. The Demon Pantry, which humbly began as a backpack program, is going to have a permanent home in one of the first-floor alcoves. The workings of this walk-in pantry will greatly help the students and families here at RJR. 

   “It is a pantry to support our Reynolds school family,” School counselor and coordinator of the Demon Pantry, Dr. Amy Williams, said. “The intention is to help meet some basic needs and help family budget ends meet.” 

   The pantry, currently located in Student Services, is where students are able to get the necessary items they need. 

   “People come into Student Services and they’ll just ask any question,” Williams said. “Do you have ‘fill in the blank?’”

   Most students know about the pantry through word of mouth, but teachers and counselors inform students if they become aware that someone has a need. The PTSA has had an extensive role in the pantry’s operations. 

   “We work as liaisons between student services,” PTSA representative Heather Bumgarner said. “We are allotted budget dollars through the PTSA that we can utilize. We also many times will make a monthly appeal through the newsletter and parents as a whole to donate needed items each month.” 

   The pantry is built on a strong relationship between the school and parents. 

   “I am here on the front line seeing what’s running low,” Williams said. “When I see that certain items are running low, we have some regular volunteers, parent volunteers. I just say, ‘Hey, we’re running low on this item or that item,’ and they’ll go purchase it.” 

   In turn, parents are vital to the success of the pantry.       

   “Parents are fantastic,” Bumgarner said. “I mean, they’re so good about when we put an appeal in the monthly PTSA newsletter. It is amazing how parents will respond. For example, this particular month, Dr. Williams indicated they need snack items like granola bars. At the meeting, parents were asking, ‘Will you send us an Amazon link?’ We’ll send it in. Parents will order them through Amazon and mail them to have them mailed directly to the school.” 

 In addition to the PTSA, many other local donors contribute to the pantry. One of these partners is Centenary United Methodist Church. 

   “We have a very strong partnership with Centenary United Methodist Church, and they have an expanded pantry there for us,” Williams said. “There is additional space for us to have products stored. Then they also do drives for us like Vacation Bible School and other times of the year.”

   These products range from food to clothes and everything in between. The program began around nine years ago and has evolved into something much more. 

   “The question came up back in 2015, in my mind, as well as the mind of some parent volunteers,” Williams said. “Like, hey, what are our students eating on Saturday and Sunday when they can’t have access to free breakfast or lunch at school.” 

   It began a backpack program that would send students home with food for weekends, longer breaks, and holidays. Through this original purpose, a greater need was discovered. 

   “We later realized that there are some other basic needs,” Williams said. “Hygiene products can be expensive and we hate for people to choose between food, medicine, or school supplies.” 

   Now, the pantry contains toiletries, hygiene products, clothes, school supplies, backpacks, and, of course, food. But the pantry doesn’t plan on stopping there. 

    “We want to do is expand it and enclose one of the alcoves here on the first floor,” Williams said. “We’re planning to have shelves put in there. They’re going to electrify it so that we can have a refrigerator, maybe a freezer, so we can have perishable food.”

   This project has been funded through grants and generous donations from partners and the RJR Alumni Association. This will create a physical Demon Pantry. 

   “To actually have a designated space within the school that provides more space and would then allow us to really expand the pantry to provide more resources,” Bumgarner said. “It would be kind of an easier student access to.”

   The sky’s the limit for the Demon Pantry, as the project has already been set in motion. The food portion is only the tip of the iceberg. 

   “The hope is that it’ll be a place where families can come shop and so they can actually select what they want or need,” Williams said. “So, we would have that open during specific hours during the school day, and then also maybe on the weekends when there’s Saturday school. Then, we’d love to have a clothing closet and I’m hoping we could have some space to do that.”

   Dr. Williams, admin, and volunteers have spent countless hours raising money and working towards constructing this pantry that will ripple benefits not only for the students but the families as well.

   “I hope that both of those things, the expanded food pantry, and the clothing closet, will completely come to fruition while I’m still here,” Williams said. “It would be a dream come true to see both of those things physically happen and for us to have steady use of both and steady donations of money, supplies, and volunteers.”