SYRACUSE — The Wawasee High School cheerleaders hosted a pet food drive at the Lakeland Youth Center Saturday afternoon.

The community service project went to benefit the New Hope Pet Rescue, and the cheerleaders challenged themselves to see how many donations they could collect within a three-hour time frame, only collecting the donations they planned to personally make in the lead-up to the drive. The result was the largest single donation the shelter had ever received.

“We dropped the items off at the rescue, and the staff there told us it was the biggest donation that the rescue has received at one time, which we were thrilled with,” stated head coach Chelsea Coy. “The team really tries to complete one community service project a year, and the team was really excited to help a local pet rescue. There are so many cats and dogs that need rescued and looking for their forever homes, and we were thrilled to help in any way that we could. We will definitely be helping New Hope Pet Rescue in the future. Thank you to the Wawasee community for making this drive a success!”