A class of third graders pose with boxes of pull tabs in the lobby of Garrett Memorial Christian School as Farm Bureau Womens' Committee Chair Mindy Lockhart prepares to take a photo.

The Garrett Memorial Christian School lobby became something of a metalworks Monday afternoon April 4 as students there lined up to donate pull tabs from aluminum cans to support the Ronald McDonald House of Arkansas.

Class after class, ranging from kindergarten to high school seniors, lined up to present boxes and Ziploc bags of tabs collected since March 1 to a delegation from the local Farm Bureau Womens’ Committee. The students’ tabs are weighed prior to their being poured into larger containers. The takings Monday amounted 99.4 pounds.

The delegation included Committee Chair Mindy Lockhart, Deanna Gilbert, Beth Lloyd and Doreen Antley.

As her third graders watched their tabs being weighed, teacher Nadine Ridings said she had worked the campaign to help sick children and their families into her lessons on the Bible, specifically on “how God wants us to be helpful.”

On Thursday morning at 8 a.m. at the school, the delegation will return to announce which class contributed the most tabs and thereby wins the pizza party. Their teacher will receive a gift basket. Other prizes include McDonald’s socks and a farm-themed bib.

The Womens’ Committee of Farm Bureau also takes part in other activities during the school  year, including offering students the chance to watch a chicken egg hatch. Doreen Antley said her committee hopes to promote to students the idea of farming as a career in a time when the number of new recruits to the profession are down. Otherwise, she said, “Who is going to grow our food?”