Canyon High School’s Safe School Ambassadors club collected $8,320 in gift card donations to help the 32 homeless students enrolled at Canyon High.

The club is comprised of 270 students united with the goal of finding ways to help their community each year. The 2017 goal of the club was to help the homeless students and their families have a better holiday through donations.

“Our hope was that in addition to getting the necessities, the parents (and) guardians would get to experience the joy of picking out a gift for their children,” said Canyon High English Teacher Cheryl Hanks, the advisor for the SSA program. 

The Santa Clarita Target and Walmart made initial donations of $20 gift certificates for 21 families before Canyon High School’s SSA students reached out via social media, requesting monetary donations and gift cards from the community of Santa Clarita.

Related: Canyon High Environmental Club Hosts Beach Clean-Up

Their social media request resulted in the $8,320 donations from Santa Clarita community members.

Distributing the donations between the 32 students and 28 families resulted in each Canyon High School family receiving $250 in gift cards along with other donations such as toiletries, while those with two Canyon High School students received $400.

“The students will never know who their efforts helped,” said news release from Canyon High School, “but they know 32 students in 28 families will at least get to share in the joy of the season.”

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