For the past several years, Oregon SC has run annual food drives to help support the Oregon Area Food Pantry. This year, we're hoping to provide even more assistance to the OAFP, which plays a vital role in our community.

All players on Recreational, 6U-8U In-House, Competitive and Academy teams will receive a pair of orange soccer socks and wear them for games in May to promote food insecurity awareness, which is our 2023-24 club charity.

Oregon SC will donate a minimum of $3,000 to the food pantry, and individuals can help us add to that total by making donations through our PlayMetrics system. All donations the club receives through May 31 will be included in the donation to the Oregon Area Food Pantry.

The socks (see below) were made by TCK and provided through our partners at Stefans Soccer. Additional socks can be purchased for $10 per pair by emailing Uniform Coordinator Beth Schwantes at uniforms@oregonsc.com.

We also will be holding our annual Spring Food Drive the weekend of May 18-19.

The OAFP served 977 unique people in 2023 — a 67% increase from 2022 — and saw 114 new families join the pantry, a 75% increase from the prior year. They provided 178,417 pounds of food and essential items to guests, 65% more than in 2022.

Additionally, the pantry also launched the OSD School Meal Program, which pays for school meals for kids in families that don't meet the Free or Reduced Lunch Program due to making slightly more than the federal guidelines. OAFP also took over the Food 4 Break Program, which provides some families that receive free or reduced school lunch gift cards to Hy-Vee, Aldi or Kwik Trip to help purchase food during the breaks in the school year calendar.

While it’s important for Oregon SC to foster development, education and enjoyment for our players on the field, we also pride ourselves on being positive members of our community — and teaching kids the importance of giving back to their community, which is part of the reason why we launched a club charity program in 2018.

For the 2018-19 season, teams wore pink socks during games in October 2018 to promote cancer research. The next season, they wore yellow socks for games in September 2019 to support suicide prevention. After a one-year hiatus in 2020-21 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, players donned blue socks in May 2022 to promote bullying awareness and then wore forest green socks in May 2023 for trees. Each of these projects were accompanied by financial donations to organizations.