SCHOOL SUPPLY PANTRY

Please note: The School Supply Pantry serves teachers only to help them provide for the success of their students.

We apologize, but we do not give supplies directly to families.

Our story

In 2006 Grace began a partnership with Keyser Elementary School as a way for the congregation to serve the neighbors surrounding the church. Out of that partnership, as we grew to know the teachers we learned of the needs of the students and teachers in the Keyser school community. One need we learned of was the great need for school supplies for the students throughout the school year. As a result of this need, we learned that public school teachers, at Keyser and throughout the U.S., purchase a large amount of the supplies needed for their classrooms with their personal finances. This knowledge led us to open a school supply pantry for the teachers of Keyser in 2007. On the second Wednesday of each month throughout the school year teachers attend the pantry and select the supplies they need for their classroom and students.

Since 2007 the School Supply Pantry has grown. As more churches began to partner with the public schools in the Rogers Learning Community we began to invite them to partner with us in the pantry. Epworth Church partner with Hawkins School. Compassion Church partners with Reynolds School. Toledo Mennonite partner with McTigue School. First Alliance Church partners with Rosa Parks School. In 2018 Grace Church partners with Keyser and Rogers High School. We currently serve approximately 240 teachers and 2500 students through the School Supply Pantry.

The pantry is supported and stocked in a number of ways. Each summer each of the partner churches hold school supply drives for their congregants to donate supplies. The partner churches then share the financial responsibility of the pantry, as well as receiving occasional grants or gifts from businesses in the community. Some of the ways Grace Church raise funds for the pantry are through the Scrip gift card program and through Kroger Community rewards. The Scrip gift card program is a program that offers us the ability to purchase gift cards for you from a large variety of local and national companies. We then receive a percentage of the gift card sale from the Scrip program. There are no additional fees to the purchaser other than the cost of the gift card. Gift cards can be purchased any time and are ordered by our office on a weekly basis. For Kroger Rewards, our community reward number is entered on the Kroger website connected with an individual’s Kroger Plus shopper’s card account and Kroger donates a percentage of the shopper’s purchases to the pantry. We will be adding other opportunities like these in the future as we continue to join shopping programs in the community. These are great ways to support the School Supply Pantry that cost you nothing but the time it takes to fill out the necessary online forms. You can sign up to partner with us in supporting the pantry through either of these programs by contacting the Grace office (419-535-0060) or email rcombs@gracetoledo.org .

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