Pitt-Bradford will host the
eighth Empty Bowls and Baskets Dinner of homemade soup and bread to raise
awareness of the fight against hunger and to raise money for the Friendship
Table.
The dinner will be held from 5 to 7 p.m., Thursday, March 21 in the
Mukaiyama University Room in the Frame-Westerberg Commons. Tickets are $10 and
will be sold at the door. Diners are invited to take home a handcrafted ceramic
bowl, a basket, or hand-sewn cloth napkin sets as a reminder that someone
else’s bowl might be empty.
“The premise behind the dinner is to offer a
simple meal of homemade soups and breads and a place at the table for all as a
way to increase our awareness of the fight against hunger,” said Dr. Holly J.
Spittler, associate dean of student affairs and director of career services,
and chairwoman of the event. “In the past eight years, this popular Women’s
History Month event has raised more than $10,000 for the Friendship Table.”
The event is a community-wide effort. Students, faculty and staff wove
baskets or painted ceramic bowls. The American Association of University Women
spent a Saturday morning sewing the napkin sets. Bradford Area High School
students created ceramic bowls. Third-grade students from School Street
Elementary and St. Bernard School, as well as third- and fourth-graders from The
Learning Center and the Bradford Area Christian Academy, decorated placemats as
part of a lesson about hunger. Campus and community volunteers made the soups
and cookies.
The Empty Bowls Dinner was initiated in 1990 when a Michigan high
school art teacher and his students sponsored the first dinner served in
handmade bowls to benefit the cause. By the following year, the originators had
developed the concept into Empty Bowls, a project to provide support for food
banks, soup kitchens and other organizations that fight hunger. Since then,
Empty Bowls events have been held throughout the world, and millions of dollars
have been raised to combat hunger. For more information on the originators of
the event, go to: www.emptybowls.net.
Other contributors include Diana’s
Ceramic Heaven, Metz and Associates, Miss Maggies, and Anne Mormile, Tops
Friendly Markets and Walmart. Other campus groups contributing are Alpha Phi
Omega service fraternity, Center for Leadership and Service, Conference
Services, Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Division of Communication
and the Arts, Division of Management and Education, Division of Physical and
Computational Sciences, Staff Association, Student Affairs and the Women’s
History Celebration committee.
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