Service

Outreach Opportunity for Youth Groups, Young Adult Groups, Newman Center communities, Parishes, & Campus Ministry Clubs

Every day in the St. Louis area, thousands of children attend school without the most basic school supplies including books, crayons, and even pencils. These children do not lack the desire to learn… they simply lack the resources. KidSmart—Tools for Learning is the only free school supply store in Missouri and is dedicated to ensuring that children and classrooms in the Greater Metropolitan St. Louis Area have the basic tools for learning by transferring, at no cost, the community’s surplus supplies and merchandise into the hands of teachers for school children in need. It is because of this great need that KidSmart is asking for your participation in our Gift of Heart supply drive throughout the month of February. The donations from this school supply drive will help restock our shelves, so area students in need have supplies to last them through the end of the school year.

We are very eager to make this drive as successful as possible, but realize its success depends largely on your willingness to participate. Please contact Megan McBride at (314) 291-6211 x 53 or megan.mcbride@kidsmartstl.org by January 15th regarding your desire to participate in KidSmart’s 2006 Gift of Heart supply drive. We are more than willing to accommodate your ideas and concerns and have a year-round need for volunteers and supplies. Thank you for your interest in partnering with KidSmart—Tools for Learning for our 2006 Gift of Heart supply drive. We look forward to working with you.

Top Ten most needed Items: Pencils, Markers, Crayons, Spiral Notebooks, Glue, Scissors, Loose Leaf Paper, Children’s Books, Pencils Sharpeners, and Backpacks

The first ever United States Mega Humanitarian Mission will run in New Orleans, LA from the 26th to the 30th of December with three days of work in the homes, parishes, and schools flooded by Katrina. Hundreds of youth and families will come to Louisiana to help in cleaning and rebuilding effort in New Orleans area homes and parishes. More important than the gift of their material assistance, is the hope their presence will bring to the city of New Orleans, its church, and its people; hope in a season and a town where it is most needed.

Almost three months after Hurricane Katrina, half of the diocese’s 150 parishes still remain closed. Hundreds of priests are unable to return to their parishes. Hundreds of thousands of New Orleans’s residents are scattered across the country with no homes or schools to come home to.

Visit the website to learn more about this and other missions in the New Orleans area.

The Foster Care Unit at Catholic Services for Children and Youth (CSCY) is in need of volunteers to be a Secret Santa for foster children. They are asking for volunteers to donate unwrapped gifts for children age 2 to 18 years old. The foster children that they serve have been blessed by volunteers’ generosity in the past. Donations will be collected between November 14 and December 9, 2005. Please deliver to CSCY in the Cardinal Rigali Center, Suite 2200. If you have any questions, please contact Kerri Burris at 792-7429.

The following are some suggestions to help make your shopping easier this season, however please feel free to donate any item you feel a child between 2 -18 years of age would appreciate:

Disposable cameras, Photo albums, Art Supplies, Journals/Diaries, Household items (towels), Clothes size S, M, L, or XL, Bath & Body Works, Hygiene items and cosmetics, CD Walkman w/batteries, Music CDs, Sports Items (football, basketball, soccer balls), Jewelry, Watches, African American dolls, Games/Board Games/Toys/Puzzles, etc.

Gift Certificates to the Movies, Restaurants, Grocery Stores, and Retail Shops were a big hit last year.