Friday, July 1, 2011

Crayons to Computers

A Free Store for Teachers!!!! How awesome is that?!?! Believe it or not, one such store exists for teachers in the Cincinnati area. The store operates on donations from the community, as well as programs that pair groups from the local prisons to make materials teachers need for their classrooms. Each year, the store has a collection drive to collect the necessary supplies to fully stock their store of all school supplies many of our students do not have access to. They then gather financial and material donations from companies, as well as the items made by local inmates.

Schools with 60% reduced/free lunch students have the opportunity to shop there once every 5 weeks. However, schools like my school don't qualify. So, the store has set up a program where teachers whose schools do not qualify can volunteer once every month and receive a voucher to allow them to shop at the store for materials.

Today, I spent 3 hours volunteering by stuffing their mailings that are sent out. In turn, I receive a voucher to come back and shop in August, as well as a sneak peak of some of their products they have to offer to teachers this year. Needless to say, I am quite excited to get my hands on them. They have seat sacks, manipulatives, binders, papers, folders, and oh so many more items only teachers would treasure. You can check out their website for further information! http://www.crayons2computers.org/ Does your community have any cool programs like this for teachers?