Back to School Event for Kirbyville students!!

For the past few years, the Kirbyville First Assembly of God Church on Trout Street has held a Back-to-School Event before school to help local students with FREE shoes, haircuts, backpacks with supplies and a lunch. The Kirbyville Area Chamber of Commerce has provided (400) four hundred lunches in the last 2 years. This year they will provide (500) five hundred lunches due to running out of lunches in the prior years. The church also ran out of shoes and backpacks with school supplies. And Patty Haley cut as many heads of hair as she could being the only stylist that day. We are hoping to have a few more stylists in our upcoming event.

So, this year Shawn and Christina Monclova decided to go big or go home. The church was just too small to have the event inside due to the overwhelming Texas summer heat outside. Shawn is a teacher at Kirbyville Junior High School so he asked the principal if we could have the event in the gym. Of course, she said yes after consulting with Mr. Stephen Edwards, the superintendent of schools. The school calendar had not been released yet so when the calendar came out and the first day of school was August 8th, we decided to have the event on July 20th.

Planning began in late January, Christina contacted Patti Greer with the Kirbyville Area Chamber of Commerce and Christina asked Patti to contact other churches to see if they would be willing to help collect school supplies. So, Patti got on the phone contacting people she knew that attended local churches and there are now twelve churches, Brookshire Brothers, Elijah’s and Friends of the Kirbyville Public Library, Kirbyville Area Heritage Society and Kirbyville Magnolia Festival Committee which have collected and donated items for this event. We are so excited that it is coming together. The Kirbyville Wildcat 4H, Girl Scout Troop 131098, and Miss Kirbyville Scholarship Pageant Queens will also be there helping us entertain the children while they wait in line for the items.

When we posted the flyer for the event on the Chamber Facebook page, people started contacting us to see how they could volunteer. On the evening of July 19th, we will be at the Jr. High Gym organizing the school supplies and lunches, volunteers will be needed to help that evening. If you want to donate school supplies, hold on to them until July 19th and bring them to the gym around 6pm. We appreciate all volunteers and any school supplies donated. This is a perfect volunteer opportunity to get volunteer hours for school club requirements. The student is responsible for getting sponsor approval, and sponsor signature on any volunteer paperwork.

We obviously want to thank the churches that are helping us by collecting school supplies. Kirbyville First Assembly of God works with a mission in San Antonio that collects the shoes that are given away that day. Life Restoration Outreach Church, Call Junction Baptist Church, Kirbyville Central Baptist Church, Kirbyville Church of Christ, Kirbyville Missionary Baptist Church, The River in Merryville, Roganville Baptist Church, Kirbyville Methodist Church, Calvary Baptist Church, North Bon Ami Missionary Baptist Church and United Methodist Church in Jasper are all the churches that have collected school supplies the past 6 months for us. Collections will be taken all the way up to the morning of July 20th at 8am. We prefer the supplies be left at the gym on July 19th, but we understand that people work and are still trying to enjoy their summer vacations.

Doors open at 10am, please be patient, during the day there will be lines everywhere but we will do our best to help you quickly so you can move on to the next line. As you enter the building you will need to register each child that is there to pick up items, please bring the child with you. There are some that received a letter at the end of the school year, you MUST bring the letter with you to receive your backpack and supplies. There will be things to entertain the kids so maybe they won’t get restless waiting in line.

We used School Supply Lists from PreK to 5th Grade because these lists generally stay the same each year and since we were working on this school supply drive for the past (6) six months it was just simpler to use these lists. That is not to say older kids won’t get backpacks and supplies but they may not get a lot of the items on their lists. We will do what we can that day. Bring your kids out and get them a haircut, a pair of shoes, a hot link on a bun lunch with chips and water and a backpack with school supplies in it. We hope to see you that day along with your patience. Send questions to: mailto:kirbyvilleareachamber@gmail.com.

Patti Greer