Students from schools all over Nassau County collected candy and donated it to South Shore Fintess in an effort to support the US Troops.

The weeks after the Halloween night candy chow-down are usually spent sifting through the leftover profits of that night and picking out the most appetizing candy. After a while, parents often throw away the dregs of what remains.  But all over Oceanside this year, in an initiative spearheaded by resident Christine Vollkommer, families are donating their leftover candy to American troops.  I had sent out a letter to all the PTAs in the school districts of East Rockaway, Baldwin, Oceanside and Lynbrook,” Vollkommer explained. “Then I sent out letters to the principals of East Rockaway, Rockville Centre, Oceanside, Lynbrook and Baldwin. And I had the principals call me and say, ‘We’re going to do a collection here and then we’ll send it to you.’”  The candy has come pouring in to South Shore Fitness, where Vollkommer works. Schools and individuals alike have been donating candy for the troops, and not just the unwanted leftovers: Vollkommer’s children, as it happens, are allergic to peanuts, so she donated all the candy they collected, including Reese’s, Baby Ruths and more.

SSF Collected over 650 pounds of candy to donate to the US Troops.

I was here the day after Halloween, just sitting here while families gave me candy,” said Vollkommer. “Why I did it out of South Shore Fitness is that I have a lot of flexibility here, and the members are so great. If you came here and saw the candy I had in a room, you’d be taken aback. It’s so much.” According to Vollkommer, she has collected well over 400 pounds of sweets so far.  Schools all over, including School 3 in Oceanside, have been collecting candy for the same cause. School 3’s site-based team — a group of two parents, two teachers and the school principal, who discuss programming and issues at the school — came up with the candy idea at a September meeting, independent of  Vollkommer. They felt that it would be a good lesson for students about community service.  Also, one of our goals is to have our students recognize that those who serve in our military are very important and should be honored, and this is one way that a child has the ability to do that for them,” said Dr. Jill DeRosa, School 3 principal.  But when Vollkommer called DeRosa about her candy drive, DeRosa decided to join that effort as well. “We had decided to organize our own collection, and one of the things that’s often challenging is that shipping can be very prohibitive,” DeRosa said. “And then I got a flier from South Shore Fitness saying that they were doing the collection. So I called them and asked them if they would be willing to include our candy with theirs, so we didn’t have to pay for the shipping.”

The Staff at SSF pose with the many boxes of candy shipped to the organization which will send them to the US Troops.

Vollkommer’s husband works for the shipping company DHL, which will be packing up the candy and sending it to a woman named Gail VanVranken in West Virginia, who runs the charity Boatsie’s Boxes. VanVranken sends care packages to troops, and the candy will be included in her Operation Christmas Stocking, which will pack up the candy along with small items like phone cards and send them to troops.   The idea for collecting candy came to Vollkommer after she read an article in a magazine about someone collecting candy and sending it to Boatsie’s Boxes. It is just another in a list of things that Vollkommer has done to support the troops since her brother, Robert Spear, a member of the 82nd Airborne division, died on Sept. 11, 2001.  “My brother was a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne, and I like doing things in his honor knowing that he would love the support,” Vollkommer said.   This is the first year that Vollkommer and the schools have joined forces. “And I want it to be the first of many,” she said. “So it ended up taking off really well.”