Saint Vincent College, Western Pa. churches collecting for Ukraine

Saint Vincent College’s education department, with assistance from several area church congregations, is collecting items to help refugees from the war in Ukraine.

Veronica Ent, who chairs the department, said its faculty and students have taken part in previous charitable efforts, but the outpouring of donations at the college in Unity to help those displaced by the fighting in Ukraine is unprecedented.

“Our students have been sorting and packing items,” she said of the donations being processed at the college’s Fred Rogers Center.”We thought we’d got to a point where we could see the floor, and the items keep coming in.

“I never imagined it would become so big.”

Among the items being sought are toys, crayons, coloring books, children’s clothes, school supplies, totes, travel cups or metal cups, blankets, scarves, shoes, gloves, cold weather items, toiletries, hair care products, bandages, diapers, infant supplies, sleeping bags and non-perishable food.

The items can be dropped off between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. through March 28 at the Fred Rogers Center.

Ent said the donations are being packed into a 26-foot U-Haul truck, with a second truck standing by if there is no room left in the first.

Students will use financial donations that have been received to purchase additional humanitarian goods for the cause.

When the staff in her department wanted to provide a tangible benefit to the refugees, by providing needed items, Ent learned of a San Francisco-based company, Teknika USA, that has ties to Ukraine and is shipping humanitarian items there, via Poland.

The items collected at Saint Vincent will be trucked to a Teknika-affiliated Interpack Systems warehouse in Mechanicsburg before being flown overseas. Some students will travel along to help unpack the items at the warehouse.

“We do a ton of business out of Ukraine, and we were very sensitive to that (refugee) situation when the war started,” said Roland Henry, one of three owners of the business. “Organizations and individuals have brought a ton of stuff in,” with at least one tractor-trailer load of items having departed the Mechanicsburg site.

The college’s Ukraine collection began on March 14. Several area churches have served as additional drop-off sites — including Manor Presbyterian Church, Church of the Ascension in Pittsburgh and Christ the King Church in Leechburg.

“It’s been rewarding to watch everything come together,” Ent said of the humanitarian collection.“We want to teach our pre-service teachers to serve others and have that mindset. We feel very strongly about trying to encourage that throughout our department.”

For more information, contact the Fred Rogers Center at 724-805-2096.

Donations can be dropped off by March 26 at Immaculate Conception Church in Irwin. The items will be collected in the children’s liturgy room beneath the church windows. For additional information, parishioners can contact the church office at 724-863-9550.