February 12, 2007

BUTLER COUNTY SCHOOL SUPPLY COALITION WINS BEST PRACTICE AWARD

BUTLER COUNTY – The Butler County School Supply Coalition was awarded a “Best Practice” Award from the John Glenn Institute for Public Service and Public Policy at The Ohio State University on January 31 at the Ohio Association of Community Action Agencies state conference. The Butler County School Supply Coalition is a collaboration of organizations and churches working together to ensure that the county’s public school students, regardless of family income, have the basic supplies needed to start the school year.

The Butler County School Supply Coalition began with four core organizations: the Board of Butler County Commissioners, the Butler County Department of Job and Family Services, the Princeton Pike Church of God, and Supports to Encourage Low-income Families (SELF).

In the past few years, the Coalition has grown to include several additional organizations, such as Outreach for Community in New Miami; the Butler County United Way; Shared Harvest Foodbank; Oxford Talawanda Community Services, Inc.; and United Way of Oxford, Ohio and Vicinity.

For the past two years, the Coalition has raised funds to purchase school supply kits for needy children. In 2005, nearly $20,000 was raised to purchase kits for about 4,000 school children. In the fall of 2006, 5,357 kits were purchased and distributed to children whose families qualified for the free and reduced lunch program. Through a combination of individual donations and fundraising efforts, a combined total of $31,611 was raised in 2006 to purchase the kits.


“The Butler County School Supply Coalition is an excellent example of diverse groups working together to achieve a positive result,” states Jerome Kearns, assistant director of the Butler County Department of Job and Family Services. “Because of this collaborative effort, last year we reached more than five times the number of children that were originally assisted when we first started helping kids with school supplies.”