LIfe's Hope Christmas Event comes to Comanche

Three semi-truckloads of Christmas goods will be making their way to Comanche full of toys and other items to distribute among students and the community on Dec. 4. 

The Life’s Hope Christmas Event will start early Wednesday morning and carry on throughout the day. 

The items consist of Amazon products that don’t sell. They partner with schools to distribute the gifts.

Getting the event to Comanche was spearheaded by Student Government Association sponsor Jack Francis and high school principal Jason Schreiner.

“We see other schools do it and Mr. Schreiner said, ‘Why don’t we do it?’” said Francis. “We met with them. It’s a big project and we wanted to bridge the community and school. It really helps the kids. We had talked about doing next year like in March, but Mr. Schreiner said let’s do it at Christmas so kids can have something for Christmas.”

Francis said he is still trying to wrap his mind around what three semis full of gifts is going to look like. 

“They told us it would probably be $1.5 million worth,” Schreiner said. “It’s going to be 76 pallets full of stuff.”

The event will take place at the high school fitness center, next to the gym and start around 8 a.m.

“We will start with our school kids,” Francis said. “They will pick one for themselves and one for a family member.”

Francis said there would be a great variety of products to choose from. The trucks are scheduled to arrive at the school around 5 a.m. Since there is such a hodgepodge of gifts, school staff will go through the gifts to make sure what is and what is not appropriate.

“Every kid from pre-k through high school, including FAME students and our teachers can get something,” Francis said.

Several school organizations and adult volunteers will be on hand to make sure things go smoothly. The FFA, student council, National Honor Society and Fellowship of Christian Athletes, to name a few, will be on hand.

“The National Guard is going to be down here to help also and local law enforcement is going to be there to help with crowd control and safety,” Francis said. “Brent Justice, who is over Life’s Hope, said it’s going to be a lot of work. Mr. Schreiner is trying to get all the details down. We’ve already got people on Facebook asking how much is it going to cost to get in. It’s not going to cost anything.”

 Schreiner said they are trying to do everything possible to be prepared.

“Everything we’ve heard so far is that it is a huge thing,” he said. “They say to get ready because it’s going to be gigantic. Jack and I have spent months trying to figure out and get it detailed enough where it will be a fantastic event. We don’t want the lack of planning to ruin it. We thought about the volunteers we would need and the organizations that could help.”

It all comes down to children having a great time.

“It’s really an opportunity for kids to experience giving and holiday spirit,” Schreiner said. “We want to see the kids just having fun at the event.”

Each class will have an opportunity to go through the gifts.

“If there’s something in there that they need, we want to be able to give that to them,” Schreiner said. “It’s just a way to give back to the community.”

After students are finished, the rest of the community will have a chance to go through the event later in the afternoon. 

“And then after that, Miss McCauley is working on a first-ever caroling event,” Schreiner said. “And then, if we have any leftover gifts, we can work to give them away through caroling. The rest will be donated to non-profit agencies. We have to plan everything. Jason Whaley is offering his time and his services because we have to plan everything down to the dumpsters, forklifts, pallet jacks and utility knives. We’ve done our best to eliminate any concerns or any problems that could surface.”

And it is more than just making sure the students have Christmas gifts.

“We want to bridge the gap between the school and the community,” Schreiner said. “If we can bridge the gap, we can meet a ton of needs and grow this place. Once that information gets out they’ll let everyone in the area know that if you want to you want to go the best school around, you need to go to Comanche.”