Here’s how to donate classroom supplies to help Wake teachers in the new school year
The WakeEd Partnership is launching a five-week supply drive on Monday to collect items that Wake County teachers can use in their classrooms for the new school year.
The Back to School with Tools4Schools campaign will run from July 11 through Aug. 16 to collect supplies to stock WakeEd’s Tools4Schools store and warehouse in Cary. Wake teachers have been going to the Tools4Schools store since it opened in January to pick up free classroom supplies for their students.
“Thanks to the generosity of this community and our many funding partners and sponsors we were able to open our free classroom supply store in January first to schools serving the lowest wealth families in Wake County, and by May to all schools in the Wake County Public School System,” Keith Poston, president of WakeEd, said in a news release.
“Now that the word is out amongst teachers about this free classroom supply store created just for them, we want to be ready and fully stocked when they welcome their students back to classrooms in July and August.”
WakeEd is a business-backed advocacy group that supports public education. The Wake County school system is leasing space to WakeEd for free to operate the store at the former Crossroads Ford Service Center in Cary.
WakeEd is citing how North Carolina teachers spend an average of $526 out of their own pockets for classroom supplies for why the store is needed.
WakeEd is looking for a long list of items such as mechanical pencils, copy paper, paper clips, loose leaf binder rings, scissors, spiral notebooks, tissues, liquid hand soap and magic erasers.
Go to https://drive.google.com/file/d/1khwnmUw4KCcEGcrW0CVd-4xZ2OmcIq5n/view for a list of popular items.
Drop-off locations
The campaign kicks off Monday at 10:30 a.m. at the Holly Springs Masonic Lodge on 224 Raleigh St. in Holly Springs. Boy Scout Troop #320 has built a wooden drop box at the lodge to collect supplies during the drive and year-round.
Other drop-off locations for the campaign include:
▪ Tools4Schools at 1660 Piney Plains Drive in Cary.
▪ Boys & Girls Club Zebulon at 1320 Shepard School Road in Zebulon.
▪ Boys & Girls Club Wake Forest at 325 S. Wingate St. in Wake Forest.
▪ Towne Bank, West Cary Branch at 5000 Valleystone Drive #110 in Cary.
▪ Towne Bank, Midtown Raleigh Branch at 353 Glenwood Ave. in Raleigh.
▪ WakeEd Partnership at 3101 Industrial Dr. Suite 100 in Raleigh.
▪ Edwards Beightol Law Firm at 1033 Oberlin Road, Suite 100 in Raleigh.
Papa Murphy’s will also collect supplies at several locations.
Go to www.wakeed.org/wakeed-partnership-launching-community-school-supply-drive-in-july for a list of other drop-off locations and information on how to make financial donations and to volunteer to unpack the supplies.
This story was originally published July 8, 2022 at 6:17 PM.
