Volunteers stuff 1,100 backpacks for students

Backpacks stuffed with supplies for upcoming school year

ORLANDO, Fla. – A Gift for Teaching, Fifth Third Bank, the city of Orlando and other volunteers are all working together to get kids back to school with the supplies they need.

They held their seventh annual Summer of Dreams backpack stuffing event. Backpacks are filled with notebooks, pencils, markers and other essentials students will need as they head back to class. The event will send 1,100 students off with the bags at the end of this week.

Fourteen-year-old Alexis Hill is also volunteering and will receive a bag, but for her, volunteering is a little more personal. Hill's mother had cancer and couldn't provide as much.

“I don't want students to go through what I went through -- me not having supplies; me not having backpacks," she said.

More than 200,000 students in Orlando will struggle to buy the basics for class this year. The students who will receive these backpacks participated in a summer program, After-School All-Stars, that provided meals, activities and learning experiences throughout the summer.


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