After several months of preparation and a badly timed snowstorm, the work of students from across the Fitch High School community came together April 19 to support efforts to end hunger.

The FHS Empty Bowls Project brought together local restaurants, community members and business and art students at the school for a night of soup and student work to benefit Groton Human Services’ food programs. This is the second year the school has put on the event, which business education teacher Steve Small said is part of a campaign to promote hunger awareness in local communities.

“I heard of other districts doing the Empty Bowls Project, and I found that it was a worldwide thing,” he said.

Starting in the fall, art students at Fitch make and glaze bowls and mugs. In the spring, students in the business education classes create a marketing campaign to coordinate and promote the event.

Other classes and honors societies also participate. Senior Zachary Cleetus, a member of the school business club, said members of his club had a variety of responsibilities, from hanging up posters to setting up for the night.

From start to finish, about 60 to 70 students were involved in the event, Small said. While guests couldn't eat out of the bowls the night of the event for sanitary reasons, the bowls entitled them to two samples from the booths in the cafeteria.

Guests could also purchase tickets for samples, from Voodoo Grill’s chicken chili and Sneekers Cafe’s New England style clam chowder to minestrone from Groton Public School’s food services department and desserts from the school’s Falcon Cafe.

Junior Emma Zelepos said her marketing class was chosen to help promote the Empty Bowls Project, and Maud Sligh, a senior, said the project is designed to show students how to put on the event from start to finish.

“I think that it went well,” Zelepos said. “We’re in a group with six other people, so trying to coordinate everyone to get on the same page and have different tasks to do was challenging.”

The Empty Bowls Project was originally scheduled for March 15, but the threat of snow on March 14 postponed it until April. Art teacher Kara Caster said the new timing worked in the favor of her students because they were able to finish 30 or 40 additional bowls and mugs.

“Students were able to glaze at will, however they wanted to design them,” she said. “We tried to be as different as possible with designs and everything so we could appeal to many different tastes.”

Students glazed about 200 bowls and mugs for the night, a mix of handmade pieces from the sculpture classes and bisqueware. Caster said that fewer than a dozen remained after the 2016 event.

Sligh said she found the project to be interesting because her research into the greater campaign showed how many families just in Connecticut experience hunger.

“It’s a good project,” she said. “The proceeds go to the Groton Human Services so they can continue to do their outreach to people. It’s a good way to spend your time.”

a.hutchinson@theday.com