On Oct. 26, more than 70 middle school students from Glenvar Middle School came to Darin and Tabitha Greear’s farm in Riner to help harvest turnips for Society of St. Andrew, who distribute the vegetables to various hunger relief agencies in and around Southwest Virginia. The students harvested more than 10,200 pounds of turnips during their community service project day. As a special reward for the student’s efforts, Dan Brann with Brann/King Farms donated a pumpkin to each student.

The Greears plant more than 6 acres of their land with turnips and now beets for the sole purpose of donating to the Society of St Andrews, an organization that is near and dear to their hearts. In addition to running the farm, Darin is a full-time real estate agent with Long & Foster REALTORS, and his wife, Tabitha, is a full-time employee of Radford University.

The project was organized and supervised by the Greears’ neighbor Randy Nolen, who is a Physical Education teacher at Glenvar. This was the third year that Glenvar middle-schoolers have participated in harvesting as their community service project, and they harvested more than 38,000 pounds during that time frame.

For more information on how you can help, please contact Sarah Ramey with the Virginia Gleaning Network Director of Society of Saint Andrew at 1-800-333-4597.

– Submitted by Stephanie Slocum, Long & Foster