As the 100th day of school approaches this week, students and teachers at Cherry Brook Primary School are wrapping up an effort to collect items for needy families.

For the second year now, classrooms at the school are collecting specific items for Gifts of Love in Avon. Students in each class are donating a different item, ranging from canned goods to toiletries. The goal is ambitious but simple — to collect at least 100 of each item. Several classrooms are already there.

Each morning, third-grade enrichment students visit the classrooms, collect the items, bring them to a designated area, put the items into large boxes and record the amounts for the teachers' records and a bulletin board display.

The students work in pairs and each team visits four classrooms.

"I like it," said Logan Pastor. "We get to ask all the teachers and they respect us."

The collectors are very invested in the project, but it's a good lesson for all the students at the school, Principal Andy Robbin said.

"It's all about goodwill and taking care of the community," he said.

He said it is another example of Canton being a "lighthouse" district that other schools are now learning from. 

This is the second year of the Gifts for Love Drive. Last year, kindergarten teacher Kelly Theriault and others coordinated the effort with Chris Napierski, Canton parent and outreach coordinator for the Avon-based Gifts of Love.

It built on a similar effort Lisa Nanni had done with her second graders in previous years.

And again this year, Gifts of Love will come to the school on the 100th Day, slated for Feb. 9, to collect the items and thank the students for their efforts.