New Project
After completing such an enormous job with Stacy's Sharing Closet before winter break I decided to branch out and start new projects. Now I am back to help Mrs. Bancroft reorganize her newly packed closets! Her closet at New Palestine Elementary is in need of revamping to a more simplistic design. I was given a diagram to follow and will be taking all of the clothing off of the shelves to then reorganizing vertically by sizes from extra small to extra large. My first section was the girls' shelving!
0 Comments
Transporting
After securing a location at New Palestine Elementary it was time to load up the boxes. It took five large flat beds to wheel over the sixty-five boxes of clothing. With the help of my classmates we were able to complete the job in no time! Huge thanks to Mrs. Bancroft and Mr. Large for helping me with this great project! Looking forward to starting new projects after break:) Sorting After long weeks of sorting, I have finally finished! I sorted nearly 3,376 pieces of clothing and filled 65 boxes ranging from children's extra small to extra large to adult clothing. Stacy and her husband had all of these clothes piled up in their basement; however, now they will have an organized system of finding specific sizes for the families that come into Stacy's Sharing Closet. It was quite a large, tedious task of finding the size then one of the nineteen categories it belongs to, but with the help of a few classmates they made the job a breeze. They helped me haul the clothing across the school and even sorted during their class period, you guys rock! I am so glad that I was given the opportunity to make such a large impact for a great cause:) 3,376 pieces of clothing sorted!Pick Up Day After a week of anticipation, the drive is finally over and I can begin counting up our donations. I am so grateful for all of the students and their families that took part in this event. New Palestine's donation box and entry bucket was full! They contributed ample amounts of pajamas that will be on the shelves of Stacy's Sharing Closet this holiday season for children in need. New Palestine Elementary had a total of 75 pairs of pajamas. Now it is time to draw a name from each bucket and award the lucky student with their movie themed baskets!
Basket Winners
By luck of the draw from Stacy's Sharing Closet's very own, our winners were Leighton, first grade, and Maxwell, fourth grader, from New Palestine Elementary! Beginning My final contribution in the project with Stacy's Sharing Closet is the creation of poster graphics. These posters will hang in the schools that house a Stacy's Sharing Closet. When families come into the schools, these posters will serve as an attention grabber so parents know where they can find this resource. Unfortunately I am not the most knowledgable with graphics so I asked a classmate, Kade Large, who is in a Graphic Design class at the high school. I provided him with their mission statement, color choices, email, logo, and some pictures of the current closets to include. I am eager to see what he will create! Final Product
After lots of hard work and creativity, Kade finally finished the poster. It looks amazing! I showed Stacy and her husband the final product and they loved it! I am excited to see these large posters framed and hung in each of the five schools to spread awareness and help families in need! Sorting
Another major contribution in my project with Stacy's Sharing Closet is the sorting of previously donated clothes. When families come into the closet with their children they are often looking for specific sizes, but unfortunately with the busyness of life and abundance of donations the load was piling up (literally). I offered to help Stacy and her husband by taking all of the clothes and sorting them into boxes by size, ranging from toddler to adult. First Delivery Has Arrived After coordinating the delivery of the bags and boxes, I needed to find a classroom to start this process and Mr. Large gladly opened up his spare room. Thursday morning Stacy and her husband unloaded two stacks of boxes and at least twenty IKEA bags overflowing with clothes. Shout out to my classmates and a few of our New Palestine Dragons football players who helped haul these bags across the school, you guys rock! I got to work folding nineteen boxes to start sorting the clothes into categories from toddler, girls and boys sizes extra small to extra large, adult clothing, and much more. With the help of some friends, we accomplished more than half of the first delivery in just one class period! I am excited to see how many pieces of clothing we can sort in just a few weeks! Flyers and Donation boxes
To promote the Popping for Pajamas drive I have gotten to work on some advertisements, entry buckets, and boxes to collect the donations. In my last post, I attached the flyers that I have created to post around the schools and to be included in the school's newsletters. I am hoping that these spread awareness and entice the students to participate. Additionally I gathered small buckets from the art room to decorate as a fun way to collect the students entries (which I will draw from in a couple weeks to crown the winner). Finally I decorated a couple boxes to collect the donations. I wrapped the boxes in red paper to make them more appealing and attached the flyer so that the students are aware of what it will be used for. Delivery Today I placed the boxes and entry buckets in the offices of the schools, and posted flyers around the schools. Also I emailed each of the teachers from Sugar Creek and New Palestine Elementary so they are aware of what this fundraiser entails. I am looking forward to the event starting the week after Thanksgiving Break! Coming together Last week after emailing both principles from New Palestine Elementary and Sugar Creek Elementary about their interest in participating in a pajama drive, they happily agreed! With the confirmation from the principles I got to work on advertising and the logistics of the event. I decided that doing a drawing would be the simplest way to crown a winner from each school. So the student gets an entry per pair of NEW pajamas they donate, and at the end I will draw out a name. Gathering all of the necessary information, I created a flyer that will be posted around the two elementary schools, as well as, included in their weekly newsletters. This week
Now that the planning is finally finished I will be working on the event itself and delivering items. The principles are allowing me to post flyers around their schools and deliver the boxes to the office on Wednesday. Additionally I will be searching for items to include in a special movie themed basket for the winners. I am excited for this event to begin and hopefully collect a lot of pajamas for a great cause! What is Stacy's Sharing Closet? Stacy's Sharing Closet is a free store located within various Southern Hancock schools designed for anyone in need of clothing for their families. Stacy Bancroft, a first grade teacher at New Palestine Elementary, and her husband founded this neat organization after witnessing numerous children coming through the school system in need of clothing. This closet offers families an easy, safe setting for families to select clean, gently used, or new clothing. Stacy opened her first closet at New Palestine Elementary last January out of an old broom closet. Since then two more closets have been opened at Sugar Creek Elementary and another at New Palestine Junior High. They have helped 38 families, 70 children, and given out almost 700 pieces of clothing. Connection I have decided to take on another project before the semester ends, and this project is really progressing quickly. Though the high school, I am taking an education professions class which means that four days a week I assist a teacher in their classroom. My sister had Mrs. Bancroft many years ago and I thought she would be an exciting, knowledgable teacher to observe. After discovering that she was in need of some help to augment the growth of her organization, I was eager to help the cause. Project Proposal After lots of research and brainstorming over the last week, I have finally decided on how I plan to actively make a difference through Stacy's Sharing Closet. Through the month of December I have come up with three events to benefit this organization. The first event is a Popping of Pajamas drive where students from New Palestine Elementary and Sugar Creek Elementary will donate pajamas the week of December 2-6. The second idea I am taking up is creating posters for each of the host schools to bring awareness of the closet's location. I am working on the logistics of the creation and materials I will need. Finally the third event I am orchestrating is sorting heaps of previously donated clothes into tubs for Stacy and her husband. By sorting the clothes into tubs by size, Stacy will have a more organized and accessible system for when families are coming in looking for specific sizes.
|