It started with $9.
Walking to class near the end of spring semester, then-freshman Maddie Meyer glanced at her student account and saw she still had a few KU Dining Dollars to spend before they expired. The idea came in a flash.
“I thought, ‘I’ll use my extra money to buy food and donate it,’” she recalls. “Then I realized, if I have extra dollars, so does everyone else.”
That spark became Leftovers with Love, a campuswide donation drive that encouraged students to use their leftover KU Dining Dollars to purchase nonperishable food and hygiene items at campus convenience-store outlets before balances disappeared at semester’s end.
Meyer, a business marketing and sports management major from Leawood, didn’t plan on launching a charity initiative that day. “I told my parents I’d just do it next year,” she says. “They said, ‘No—you see the need, fill it.’ So I did.”
Within a week, the Corbin Hall resident had turned her spontaneous idea into an organized effort. She created flyers, set out donation bins in residence halls across campus, and started spreading the word in classes, on social media and, most successfully, by word of mouth with friends throughout the Greek community and other student organizations. “It all happened so fast,” she says. “At first I thought, ‘What if no one donates?’ Then the bins started overflowing.”
More than 2,000 items poured in—canned goods, shampoo, detergent, toothpaste, snacks—all purchased with Dining Dollars that would have otherwise vanished into the ether. “I was not expecting that at all,” Meyer says. Local media took notice; KU’s student news channel featured Meyer’s story, helping Leftovers with Love go viral around campus.
Donations were split between two local nonprofits: the Ballard Center, which received the food, and the Willow Domestic Violence Center, which received the hygiene products.
Ballard holds special meaning for Meyer. Through her Pi Beta Phi sorority, she volunteers there weekly, helping preschool children with reading, counting and spelling. “Sometimes we just play with them on the playground,” she says.
That service experience, combined with Leftovers with Love, has shaped Meyer’s sense of purpose at KU.
“I’ve always been service-oriented,” she says. “I went to Catholic school my whole life, and service was a big part of that. KU is a different environment, but this showed me I could take what I’ve learned and apply it here. It’s given me confidence that I can take initiative and do something meaningful.”
She plans to bring Leftovers with Love back this spring with even more coordination among KU Dining and student housing. “It all came together so quickly that I didn’t have time to get official support,” Meyer says. “Now I want to build more structure so it lasts beyond me.”
Her effort didn’t just rescue unused Dining Dollars—it inspired others to think creatively about giving. “Even if two people benefit,” Meyer says, echoing advice from her mom, “that’s still two people better off.”
Looking back, she still sounds surprised at how far a single idea went. “It’s crazy—it just took off,” she says. “It was the most fulfilling thing I’ve ever been part of. Doing something greater than yourself—that’s what it’s all about.”
Chris Lazzarino, j’86, is associate editor of Crimson & Blue.
