Cereal Box Challenge Knocks Down 1,300 Boxes For Charity

SHAKER HEIGHTS, OH — Lomond Elementary students collected more than 1,300 boxes of cereal for charity...and to form a winding domino chain through their school.

Students and staff at the school collected the cereal boxes to donate to the Unity in the Community Food Pantry. The hook was this: Before they were donated, the collected boxes would be lined up through the school and then — like all good elaborate domino chains — knocked down. And students should get to watch the whole thing.

It also became a lesson in practical mathematics.

"We tied math to the collection by measuring the halls, cereal boxes, how many we could store on the table, and determined how much we needed. It was determined we needed 1,000 boxes to be able to have the dominoes go from upstairs, down the center hall staircase and then down the halls on the first floor," Tina McCauley, Lomond assistant principal, told Patch.

On Tuesday, the staff counted. They had collected 600 boxes of cereal. Two days later, they doubled that cereal box count.

"We have had community members from all of Shaker, former Lomond students, and many more donate," McCauley said. Community members who couldn't get to the store gave cash to teachers and staff. That money was used to buy 100s of additional boxes.

As the chain of cereal boxes wound through the school, staff realized the domino sequence wasn't just a mathematical lesson. It was also an example of kindness' effect on the world.

"We are connecting one box falling and starting a chain of all the boxes falling to kindness. That one act of kindness can spur others to be kind and before you know it, just your one action has multiplied into many. This is one way to share the Lomond love with our community," McCauley said.

And after the lessons were completed and imparted...the students watched as the boxes came tumbling down. Watch the domino effect below!