San Diego State’s Aztecs Rock Hunger canned food drive took in more than 227,000 pounds of food, doubling the amount of food it collected last year, the San Diego Food Bank announced Monday at the award ceremony.

SDSU’s Associated Students had only expected to collect about 150,000 pounds this year, A.S. Vice President of External Relations Javier Gomez said. Last year’s Aztecs Rock Hunger drive produced about 107,000 pounds of food.

“I’m really proud of what our students have been able to do,” SDSU President Elliot Hirshman said after the ceremony.

University of California, San Diego and California State University San Marcos also participated in the food drive, which brought in a total 244,689 pounds of food. Approximately 93 percent of the total food collected came from SDSU.

The San Diego Food Bank feeds 320,000 San Diegans every month, focusing its efforts on low-income families, President James Floros said. About one in six San Diego County residents are eligible to use the food bank’s services.

“When I first joined the food bank I really didn’t know just how many people were in need in San Diego,” Floros said.

The goal for this year’s holiday food drive is to collect more than 700,000 pounds of food,  Floros said. The food bank estimates that 1.2 pounds of food equates to a single meal.

Floros, a UCSD graduate, said the food bank is working on incorporating the University of San Diego and Point Loma Nazarene in future food drives.

The food bank is still accepting direct donations or donations through its buy-a-bag partnership with Vons.

With the success of this year’s food drive the biggest challenge facing Aztecs Rock Hunger next year is topping this year’s haul, Gomez said .

“Really I think it just comes down to awareness,” Gomez said. “When students see how easy it is to donate they’ll start to join in.’’

Photo by Luke Henning, staff writer.