On a cold Saturday morning in February, nearly 100 members of the Divine Nine, the nine historically African American fraternities and sororities, gathered at the Greater Chicago Food Depository for the organization’s fourth annual Black History Month repack event, bringing energy and friendly competition to the warehouse.
The event honored the organizations’ long tradition of service and mutual aid in Black communities. The Divine Nine organizations were founded on principles of scholarship, leadership and service, and their hard work in the warehouse reflected a legacy of collective action.
Service in action
Dressed in their Greek letters and colors, volunteers of multiple generations worked side by side in our warehouse. Some were meeting for the first time, while others reunited with longtime friends.
Two members of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority repack food into family sized portions during the Greater Chicago Food Depository’s Black History Month volunteer event. (Photos by Joshua Joel for the greater Chicago Food Depository.)
Together, they repacked bulk food purchased by the Food Depository into smaller, family-sized quantities for distribution to our partner food pantries throughout Chicago and Cook County. For the competition, teams split into two rooms and packed loaves of bread into boxes with speed and precision.
“Service is central to the Divine Nine’s mission,” said Reginald Summerrise, president of the National Panhellenic Council of Chicago and a member of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity.
“We are happy to be here supporting the Food Depository and those less fortunate and upholding the values of the Divine Nine.”
Advocacy and collective action
Before they started volunteering, the morning opened with remarks from Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton (Alpha Kappa Alpha) via video and State Rep. Camille Y. Lilly (Delta Sigma Theta), who emphasized the Divine Nine’s shared responsibility to address hunger and other urgent needs in their communities.
State Rep. Camille Y. Lilly of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority addresses Divine Nine volunteers, emphasizing the importance of protecting SNAP and addressing hunger in Illinois.
“We are Black professionals who have a mission in front of us,” said Lilly, referring to the organizations’ shared mission to serve communities facing hunger and barriers to basic necessities. “We graduated, we went on to work and we continue working together in our communities as brothers and sisters.”
Lilly underscored the importance of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which helps millions of people afford groceries, and warned that recent federal policy changes could reduce access to benefits for many households.
“The SNAP program was put in place to ensure that people who didn’t have access to food would have access to food,” she said. “Food is an essential part of life, and these policies are hurting all of us.”
Reginald Summerrise (left), president of the National Panhellenic Council of Chicago, poses with Food Depository employee Vanessa Lewis and another volunteer during the Black History Month repack event.
Danielle Perry, the Food Depository’s vice president of policy and advocacy, spoke about the organization’s efforts to spread awareness about the importance of SNAP and the recent cuts to the program included in H.R. 1.
She highlighted SNAP’s critical role in preventing hunger and urged attendees to educate their communities about new work requirement changes that could cause more than 200,000 Illinois residents to lose benefits. After the remarks, volunteers got to work, packing and sorting food to put those concerns into action.
Johnsy Edwards, 67, a member of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority who works as a registered nurse and case manager at Mount Sinai Hospital, said seeing the effects of food deserts firsthand pushed her to get involved.
A member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity lifts a crate filled with loaves of bread as he helps pack food for families across Chicago and Cook County.
“Everyone deserves to get the food they need to stay healthy,” she said. For Edwards, volunteering feels like a simple way to show up for her community. “It doesn’t take much to lend a hand,” she added. “If we all do a little, it really adds up for families who need it.”
Packing food and strengthening community
At the end of the day, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority claimed first place in the repack competition for the second year in a row, repacking 2,676 pounds of food, or the equivalent of 3,211 meals. Across all Divine Nine organizations, volunteers packed 16,104 pounds of food, or the equivalent of 19,325 meals for delivery to the Food Depository’s partner network.
Members of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority won first place for the second year in a row at the Food Depository’s Black History Month repack event.
Beyond the final tally, the event was a reminder of what is possible when communities unite around a shared purpose. As challenges to the food safety net continue, partnerships like this one highlight the strength of collective service and advocacy.
Through teamwork and a deep commitment to their communities, Divine Nine volunteers helped ensure that more of our neighbors have access to the food they need to thrive.
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