Naples teens collect food for St. Matthew’s House

Teenagers in one Naples neighborhood went from house to house picking up bags of donated food to send to St. Matthew’s House.

“We made bags with signs that has a description of what needs to be in the bag,” said Madison Knightly, one of the teen organizers of this effort.

Knightly and others left 400 bags at the door of each home in the neighborhood and told people exactly what to put in them. “We’re looking for cans or pasta or cereals, non-perishable stuff like that that we can bring to a warehouse,” Knightly said.

Now the bags are on their way to families in need.

After volunteering with St. Matthew’s House this summer, Isabela Jackson’s eyes were opened and she knew she had to help.

“We noticed that a lot more food is being taken and not necessarily replenished as fast as it usually is because of the more families that St. Matthew’s House is helping,” said Jackson, another organizer of today’s collection.

So Madison and Isabela teamed up to make sure family’s in SWFL won’t go hungry.

“We’ve noticed that even just one bag from each house will help more than enough families and we think just this one food drive can help all those families who are suffering due to COVID-19,” said Knightly.

Not only do they hope to help heir own community but they want to inspire others to do the same!

“We also hope to inspire others to try and do the same thing where they live,” Jackson added.

St. Matthew’s House says that thanks to these two Gulf Coast High School Students, 350 families will have food.