PBH Aims to Collect 1,000 Toys for Needy Kids

This time of year ten years ago, Phillips Brooks House (PBH) modestly collected toys for five child service agencies. Today it’s targeting twice as many agencies—aspiring to collect more than 1,000 toys for needy children in the Cambridge and Boston area.

After a two-week drive to collect gift items ranging from stuffed animals to DVD players, the PBH Holiday Gift Drive will wrap up tomorrow.

The gift drive is been an opportunity for Harvard’s employees to give to the community, said Zandra Kambysellis, the PBH department administrator in charge of the initiative.

“Given the time of year, most students are already quite busy wrapping up projects with their service organizations and preparing to head home for the winter break,” Kambysellis said. “The Holiday Toy Drive has therefore traditionally been a staff and administrative effort for Phillips Brooks House.”

She added that the drive is “of course open to anyone who is interested.”

PBH placed boxes in more than 35 campus institutions ranging from the Freshman Dean’s Office to Harvard University Dining Services, as well as the lobbies of University Hall and Memorial Church.

Student volunteers will help to collect and sort the goods from Dec. 14 to 18.

If the collection box in PBH’s own lobby is any indication, those boxes will be brimming with board games and building blocks.

The program director of the Cambridge Community Center, which runs an after-school program for children, said his center eagerly awaits the donations.

“Every year we do a holiday party here with the kids,” Brendan Brett said. “There’s one family in particular that has six children and really can’t afford Christmas for two of them, so the donated gifts gives these kids something you can’t depend on them getting at home.”