Photo courtesy of Rozanne Oggler
Maintenance technician Dennis Fedden plays Santa for Megan Miller, 4, during the Maintenance staff’s annual Christmas breakfast and fundraiser for struggling families in Hillsdale County.
What do they do when the students are all gone? Many students have a hard time picturing the college staff doing anything that doesn't pertain to them in some way.
Well, this year the students left and the faculty had a grand old party. In fact, the Hillsdale College faculty and staff have a party every year after Christmas break begins.
For more than twenty years the maintenance staff has hosted this Christmas breakfast and coupled it as a fundraiser for families in need.
Rozanne Ogger, office aide for the physical plant, said the event began as a social gathering but soon evolved into a charitable event working with the Community Action Agency in Hillsdale and gathering toys for those struggling in the county.
This year was their most profitable fundraising year, she said. The staff raised almost $2000 and aided nine families in the community.
Dennis Fedden, maintenance technician, has played the part of Santa for more than five years now and said he absolutely enjoys the experience.
After the breakfast, he packs up all the toys and heads out to previously chosen homes to surprise the kids with toys.
The toys that the staff provides are usually chosen from a list the children have given the Community Action Agency.
“We always get that one family who is in just dire need for help,” Fedden said. “We just love to show the kids that they get to have a Christmas too.”
One little red-headed girl especially melted his heart, Fedden said. Megan Miller, age 4, was so well spoken for her age that she corrected Santa not long after he came in the door.
“I asked her about her hamster on the table,” Fedden said, “and she quickly told me that it was not a hamster, it was a guinea pig and that her grandmother was not allowed to feed it radishes because it gave the guinea pig terrible gas.”
Megan's mother, Becky Helton, said that Megan had always been afraid of Santa and so she was a bit wary of having him visit the house.
“But as soon as he [Fedden] walked in the door, she was all over him,” Helton said. “It was just wonderful for her to see that Santa would actually come visit her. To say she loved it would be an understatement.”
While this annual charity is a lot of fun and smiles for all those involved, it does require quite a bit of extra work for the maintenance staff.
Ogger said that in order to make the event work, the maintenance staff supervisors have to shop for all of the groceries and arrive at the Fowler building at 4:30 a.m. to begin cooking for the breakfast.
The three office aides for the physical plant and campus security offices then arrive at 6:30 a.m. to begin decorating and their hostess duties.
The expression on the children's faces make all the extra work worth it though, and in the end, “Santa's just a jolly fellow that loves what he does,” Fedden said.