5th Annual Back Pack Angel 2009

Thanks to your support we were able to give away over 1000 Back-Packs and about $20,000 worth of school supplies on August 6th in Louisville and August 11th in Southern Indiana! (See CJ article below)

So many kids and parents had big smiles on their faces as they received their back packs. It was awesome!

We have more back-packs and supplies coming in as we still have 500+ kids on our waiting list.

Some of the ladies who work for BB&T Bank called and said they were approved for $5000 to help with our Back-Pack Angel Program so they have been busy hitting up all the stores for special deals on supplies & back-packs.

Backpacks, supplies get school year going By Jaz Gray • jgray@courier-journal.com • August 6, 2009 • Hundreds of backpacks were filled with school supplies and given to nonprofit groups serving underprivileged children during the Backpack Angel Giveaway at Union Station Thursday morning. The event, run by Service for Peace and hosted by the Transit Authority of River City, gave away about 600 backpacks filled with notebooks, pencils, pens and flash drives. Peter Hayes, Louisville coordinator for Service for Peace, said that while going back to school may be a “fun time” for children in the middle-class, it leaves other children “kind of embarrassed.” “The backpacks and supplies help children whose families cannot afford to get the proper supplies for school,” Hayes said. “It gives them the tools, so that they can succeed.” Service for Peace plans to extend the giveaway program with a Backpack Angel store so that teachers and non-profit organizations will be able to get supplies and help students throughout the year, he said. The event was sponsored by Office Depot, Target, State Farm, Genentech, Norton Healthcare and Carrell Rogers Cleaning and Restoration, which also provided free doughnuts and coffee for the volunteers. Among the organizations receiving backpacks Thursday were St. Anthony's Outreach Center and Arcadia and Americana community centers.