Darien’s Middlesex Middle School hosted hundreds of volunteers on Saturday to help feed children overseas.

The annual pack-a-thon benefitted ‘Feed My Starving Children,’ a Christian nonprofit organization committed to feeding children in need globally. It took a pause during the pandemic, but it has returned bigger than ever.

“We’re packing over 100,000 meals and sending them to a developing country where nine kids die a day from hunger,” said Paige Westbrook, the Darien chapter president of Feed My Starving Children.

The team, led by local high schoolers, raised more than $30,000 in donations.

“We’ve seen a lot more volunteers and it’s great to get different teams in the community, sports teams also involved,” said Ella Schaller, a sophomore at Darien High School.

Each bag filled contains food items approved by nutritionists.

“We are in 100 countries right now. We send them to Guatemala, Haiti, the Philippines,” said Amy Barneck, from Feed My Starving Children. “It helps those kiddos get the nourishment that they need so they can grow and be strong…be like regular kids and go to school.”

Volunteers worked all day to get the bags packed.

“People are listening to music, jamming out. You scream when you get a pallet, which is over 100 meals,” said Westbrook. “It’s definitely a lot, you get tired throughout the day, but the drive and the environment really help you get through it.”

All that hard work will produce enough meals to feed nearly 300 children for an entire year.