Abel Gilbert believes shoe boxes might be changing lives.
That's why the 20-year-old linguistics junior was overjoyed when his service fraternity, Omega Delta Phi, decided to send boxes full of toys to several countries for the holidays.
Erik Kinard, the chapter's community service chair, decided to have the fraternity participate in Operation Christmas Child for the first time as part of its Founders' Week on Sunday.
Operation Christmas Child, run by Samaritan's Purse, a christian missionary organization, collects shoe boxes filled with toys and hygienic products and distributes them to 16 different countries every year, according to the Samaritan's Purse website.
Its drop-off deadline for locations across the U.S. is Monday, though contributors will still be able to submit packages online.
Gainesville has seen an average increase of 500 boxes each year, with the exception of a 500-box decrease down to 6,000 in 2010, said Sam Middleton, coordinator for the Santa Fe River area, which includes Alachua, Bradford, Union and Putnam counties.
Middleton works at the drop-off center hosted by the First Church of the Nazarene, 5020 NW 23rd Ave., the only drop-off center for the shoeboxes in Gainesville. He said in terms of population, Gainesville has the largest ratio of contributions in the Santa Fe River area.
Sunday, the brothers of Omega Delta Phi put together about 40 boxes filled with donated toys such as dinosaur figurines, balls and stuffed animals, as well as toothbrushes and toothpaste.
President Gilbert said he hopes the fraternity participates again next year and continues to remind needy children that they are remembered.
"If I could send them a message, it would say, ‘Someone in the states is thinking of you,' with a heart next to it."
