Each student grabbed a plastic bag and got to work.
Creekside Elementary School students walked around cardboard boxes, stuffing each baggie with mini sticks of deodorants, tubes of toothpaste, shampoo, socks, snacks and water.
Then, each of the more than 500 students scrawled messages such as "Smile," "Happy Valentine’s Day," and "Have a great day," on postcards that were stuffed into each baggie.
More than 550 students at the elementary school in Franklin filled a baggie Thursday with basic toiletries and other items as part of the school’s Blessing Bags initiative.
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Each baggie will be given to local churches and KIC-IT, who will then give out the bags to people in Franklin struggling with homelessness.Â
The project began around Christmas 2017 when an educator learned that hundreds of students who attend Franklin schools struggle with homelessness.
"I just remember thinking, ‘Wow, that is staggering to me," Alysha Sherry, Creekside’s physical education teacher, said.
Sherry started having her own children make Blessing Bags.
Then, individual classrooms were making them. That Christmas, it became a school-wide initiative. This Valentine’s Day marks the second time the entire school together has made the bags to be given to local homeless people. Sherry suspects that some of the same children making the bags will likely receive the bags themselves, she said.
Classes filtered into the gym throughout the day, where Sherry and other educators explained the impact of what they were doing. They told the students about people who were homeless and encouraged each of them to think about who they were making the bags for.
"It inspires a lot of us to learn more about homelessness and teaches us that we should care about them," said Emma Leugers, a fourth-grader at the school.
Sherry partnered with Love More, a Franklin nonprofit organization that encourages people in the community to do projects that promote kindness. Each of the messages stuffed into each plastic baggie was written on the back of a Love More postcard.
Projects like the Blessing Bags are what Love More promote throughout the community, according to Erin Davis, a Love More organizer.
"It is one of those things we don’t see, but we need to take care of each other," Davis said.
Statistics show that a staggering amount of families are one missed paycheck away from homelessness. And Franklin has hundreds of students who are living in hotels, couch surfing or have no where to stay on an ongoing basis, Sherry said.
"There are a lot of organizations locally that will use these Blessing Bags," she said.
Students at Creekside Elementary School spent about a month collecting items that could be inserted into the bags. Local dental offices donated toothbrushes and mini toothpastes. A local car dealership donated money to help buy some of the items, Sherry said.
"It’s crazy to me how much the community helps with this," she said.
The project is also being used as a way to teach students empathy by having them help with a project that directly impacts someone they may know, Sherry said.
"This is a great was to reinforce a lesson in empathy," she said.
Students who spent time putting together the bags realize that there are needs in the world beyond what they see, fourth-grader Brooks Huddleston said.
"There are other people in the world besides me that need stuff," he said.
