Helping families in need get their children ready for school, JFCS of the Suncoast, in partnership with Sarasota Young Professionals Group (YPG) and the newly formed BeyondMe philanthropic initiative, recently joined forces at Boys & Girls Club to fill more than 1,500 backpacks with school supplies. The event also served as the first coordinated effort to engage BeyondMe volunteers with a way to give back. The backpack supplies, ranging from pens and pencils to erasers, notebooks, sharpeners, safety scissors, tissues, protractors and rulers, scientific calculators and glue sticks, were sponsored through financial and in-kind donations from Dean and Patty Miller, as well as Tiny Hands Foundation and Hope 4 Communities. The backpacks were distributed to kindergarten through middle school children from Title I schools as well as local churches and social service organization programs in Sarasota and Manatee Counties, including JFCS’ Building Strong Families, Healthy Children Healthy Families, Healthy Children Healthy Fathers, Operation Military Assistance, Children’s Crisis, Counseling, STARS and Camp Mariposa programs.

JFCS of the Suncoast