A campaign to provide disadvantaged Vermont schoolchildren with backpacks and school supplies wraps up this week, with a trunk worth being delivered to families in Burlington.
Families served by the city’s Committee on Temporary Shelter will be given backpacks filled with notebooks, pencils, glue sticks, scissors and other supplies Wednesday at the COTS shelter on Main Street.
The supplies were raised by Citizens Bank’s "Gear for Grades" campaign, which collected the donated materials at branch banks through the summer.
Rita Markley, executive director of COTS, says that for many people strapped for cash, school supplies can be out of reach. She says the response to the campaign shows people understand how important it is to send children to school prepared.