GREENFIELD — Organizers of the 19th annual Blooming Backpacks drive are seeking donations of new backpacks filled with school supplies through Aug. 10.

The event, spearheaded by Women’s Way, an affinity group of United Way of the Franklin & Hampshire Region, has provided hundreds of backpacks each year to students across Franklin County since it began in 2005.

Backpack and supply donations for students in elementary school through high school can be dropped off at the United Way’s Greenfield office at 51 Davis St., Suite 2. Alternatively, monetary donations that will be used to buy extra supplies are welcome at bit.ly/3O9iNaj. Donations can also be brought to a celebration with refreshments at the John Zon Community Center on Thursday, Aug. 10, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Checks should be written out to United Way of the Franklin & Hampshire Region, with “Blooming Backpacks” written on the memo line.

“We have very consistent donors to the drive each year, which is wonderful,” said Jenny Coeur, program manager with United Way of the Franklin & Hampshire Region, “and ... we are able to get new folks and new organizations to also do collections. So, the response has been steady and very helpful over the years.”

Nonprofit partners — including Big Brothers Big Sisters of Franklin County, The United Arc, Community Action Family Center and Youth Programs, the Mary Lyon Foundation and Montague Catholic Social Ministries — will distribute the supplies to students in the region.

Coeur said she was a teacher for 13 years before changing careers, so she knows as much as anyone the difference quality backpacks and supplies can make.

“Support for school supplies really means that both families and schools have more room in their budgets,” she said. “It’s a small thing, but it adds up quickly.”

Charity Day, chair of Women’s Way, said colleagues Carole Pennock and Amy Clarke brainstormed Blooming Backpacks in 2005 to help take one burden off families who are struggling to make ends meet. She explained all backpacks given to schoolchildren are new, colorful and designed with popular characters “so they fit right in.”

“The community always comes together to make sure that people in our community, whether it be children or families or individuals, have what they need, whether it be school supplies or food,” Day said, referencing United Way’s Supper for Six food drive.

She said she it is extremely excited to have the first in-person backpack drive since the deadly pandemic.

Day noted she is “ecstatic” to get to use the John Zon Community Center for an in-person celebration following years of modified Blooming Backpacks drives amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

To RSVP to the Aug. 10 event and learn more about donating to the drive, email program@uw-fh.org, call 413-584-3962, ext. 102, or visit uw-fh.org/womensway, where you can find a list of suggested school supplies.

Reach Domenic Poli at: dpoli@recorder.com or 413-930-4120.

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