Cambria Heights High School seniors Ava Haluska (left) and Brooklyn Galinis were part of the school’s Jared box delivery team at UPMC Altoona Monday. Mirror photo by William Kibler

Students and faculty members from Cambria Heights High School packed and delivered 235 “Jared boxes” full of puzzles, games, toys and other items Monday to UPMC Altoona to help young patients pass the time, in honor of a State College boy who died of a brain tumor at age 6 in 2000.

Leading the group was school Principal Eric Thomas, whose first cousin once removed, the late Jared McMullen, is the namesake of the boxes — delivered as part of a program that has become national in scope, with more than a million boxes having been delivered to more than 500 hospitals since the project started in State College 2001.

Jared was a patient at Geisinger Janet Weis Children’s Hospital in Danville and always had a box of toys and games with him that he would share with other patients, while also playing games with those other patients, Thomas said.

He was an enthusiastic, mature kid, and would worry about others who didn’t have things to do, Thomas said.

The program began with his classmates at Our Lady of Victory Elementary School and was intended to be a one-time project, the program website states.

“It’s still going strong,” Thomas said.

“We’re very honored to be able to do this,” said Cambria Heights senior Ava Haluska, who was at the hospital Monday as part of the delivery team.

It’s fun to go out and buy things for the program, said senior Brooklyn Galinis.

Accumulating the items goes on all year, Haluska said.

Patton Presbyterian Church and Ashville and Saint Benedict VFWs contributed significantly to this year’s effort, said Heights teacher Michele Schirf.

The items were distributed in boxes labeled according to the age range for which the items inside were appropriate.

There were stuffed animals for infants, Play-Doh for pre-schoolers; and crossword puzzle books for high schoolers.