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Donors ‘Stuff the Bus’ with school supplies

By Elvyn Jones - | Aug 9, 2011

As USD 464 transportation coordinator, Melissa Ostermeyer likes to see buses filled but she was particularly thrilled with the progress made Thursday toward filling one bus.

The bus was parked Thursday and Friday in front of Tonganoxie High School, where families were enrolling students for the coming year. There, student volunteers collected school supplies from donors, storing them in the bus to be distributed later to students in need.

Ostermeyer said Friday the “Stuff the Bus” campaign originated from bus drivers, who yearly witnessed students get on their buses in need of school supplies. The school supply drive was tried about a decade ago, but the location at the grocery store didn’t seem to be as conducive to garnering donations as the school location, she said.

Preoccupied with her enrollment duties, she hadn’t been able to see what student volunteers had collected from donors on Friday but was very happy with Thursday’s haul.

“I’m thrilled with what we collected on the first day,” Ostermeyer said. “I went into this thinking if we got enough for one child it would be a success, but I really think we should be able to address all the needs this year, as far as school supplies go.

“We literally have the bus almost stuffed.”

Senior Sagan Scates and junior Hannah Kemp took the late morning, early afternoon shift Friday as volunteers at the bus. They had several donors drop off school supplies early in their shift, they said, which they placed with the pencils, notebooks, backpacks and other school supplies in the bus.

Ostermeyer said those unable to leave supplies at the bus may drop them off in the coming weeks at any of the district’s three schools or at the administrative office.