Gautier students learn outside the classroom in soup kitchen - WLOX.com - The News for South Mississippi

About 20 Gautier Middle School students arrived at Our Daily Bread in Pascagoula Wednesday, loaded down with more than 500 cans of food they collected. Then they took a tour of the soup kitchen, stocked shelves and helped prepare the day's meal.

Mary Meldren runs the kitchen that serves almost 4,000 meals a week. Wednesday, she had one goal for the students. 

"I want them to take home the knowledge that there's so many people that are hungry here in Jackson County," Meldren said.  "That when they finally do see what walks in these doors they'll have the feeling of what it means to be truly humble, to be truly hungry."

The students learned quickly, including .  

"I didn't know that there were that many homeless people here and I feel real great about it. I didn't know that so many people came here and we're going to help them," student Shannon Powell said.  

"There's way more people out there starving and that's hungry," student Bobby Smith said. "More than I thought and that really is a bad thing. And I'm privileged to come and help these people that are in need, since I have plenty." 

Other students, like Rauje' Little, are hoping to spread the word. 

"I'm going to talk to my family and other people about it because it's not something that the world is aware of and taking it like a big deal and people should know about it," Little explained.  

The students worked hard helping with just about anything that needed to be done. But their teacher, Kristina Higuera, also wanted to see the kids come away with something else from this experiment, something they can never learn in the classroom. 

"I want the students to have a first hand experience of what it feels to just serve, just like Jesus came to serve," Higuera said.  "I want them to be able to serve for themselves." 

All the students who took part in Wednesday's service project belong to the Fellowship of Christian Students organization at Gautier Middle School.

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