Push for Pencils Blog
Blues Mascot Louie visits KidSmart
St. Louis Blues mascot, Louie, will be at the KidSmart Free Store Wednesday, August 11, to visit with teachers! If you haven’t yet shopped in August - this might be the day to join us!
Posted by Christy on August 09, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Walmart $100 Shopping Spree Back-to-School Contest
Deadline-July 30, 2010 to win a $100 back-to-school gift card from Walmart! Calling all middle school teachers and students! If you are entering 6th-8th grade you are eligible to participate in the 2010 Walmart Back-to-School Essay Writing Contest. Simply write a 100 word essay and be sure to submit your entry this week. Click on the “Walmart” link found on the KidSmart homepage for more details. One hundred local middle school aged children will each win $100 gift cards for back-to-school shopping at Walmart. In honor of the winners, Walmart will donate an additional $100, per winner, to KidSmart to equip 45,000 St. Louis kids in need with the school supplies and educational resources they desperately need for back-to-school this August.
Posted by Jennifer on July 25, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Thank you Fair St. Louis!
Thank you Fair Saint Louis! Thank you to KidSmart partners: Fair Saint Louis Foundation, KMOV, Schnucks and John Legend and his “Show Me Campaign” Foundation for partnering with KidSmart during the month of July to collect school supplies for St. Louis kids in need. Beginning with the July 4th weekend and the fabulous John Legend concert, each weekend the St. Louis community was encouraged to drop off school supplies at the entrance of Fair Saint Louis, the Celebrate St. Louis Summer Concerts or at the KMOV studios. Initiated by Fair Saint Louis in partnersip with six-time Grammy Award winning artist, John Legend, this movement will help KidSmart stock the shelves of the KidSmart Free Educational Supply Store for re-opening on Tuesday, August 3. Thank you St. Louis and thank you Fair Saint Louis, KMOV, Schnucks, and John Legend for your belief in the power of education for tens of thousands of St. Louis kids in need!
Posted by Jennifer on July 25, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Push for Pencils Community Partners-Crown Vision Center & Commerce Bank
Crown Vision Center and Commerce Bank retail locations will serve as the 2010 KidSmart Push for Pencils Community Partners again this August 1-August 31. All twenty-three (23) Crown and fifty-two (52)Commerce retail locations will have Push for Pencils collection bins in which the St. Louis public may drop off brand new school supplies to support Push for Pencils and supplying tens of thousands of local kids in need for back-to-school. Push for Pencils is Missouri’s largest back-to-school supply drive. More than 100 local businesses and 50,000 employees join together to equip St. Louis children in need with the school supplies they must have to learn and succeed in school. In it’s seventh year, the generosity of the St. Louis community has grown this movement to annually collect 500,000 school supplies and nearly $100,000 in cash donations. Financial support is used by KidSmart to purchase basic, consumable supplies: paper, pencils, markers, crayons and glue. Even with the great success of the Push for Pencils drive, KidSmart has never had enough of those top five most needed basic supplies to fully equip all St. Louis children in need. Thank you Crown Vision Center and Commerce Bank for leading the St. Louis community as KidSmart’s cornerstone community partners for the 2010 Push for Pencils campaign. For more information on getting involved or for Crown and Commerce locations, visit the Push for Pencils website at www.kidsmartpushforpencils.org.
Posted by Jennifer on July 25, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Guest Blog: Shimmy Gray-Miller on Winning the 2010 Joe Buck Celebrity Bee
Disappointed. Dejected. Heartbroken.
That’s how I felt after the first three years of competing in the Joe Buck / Kidsmart Celebrity Bee. Each year I was paired up with a Corporate Sponsor and we walked on that stage side by side confident that this would be the year that we beat the other celebrity/corporate teams and took home the crown. Each year I went home with wonderful parting gifts but no crown. I really wanted that crown. Badly.
After last years 4th runner up finish, I decided to put my coaching instincts to work. I trained. Just not in the way that one of my athletes trained. I didn’t train my body. I trained my mind. I watched countless episodes of Celebrity Jeopardy, (not the real Jeopardy because those questions are way too hard), Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader, (sometimes I was and sometimes I wasn’t), and Fear Factor, (which had absolutely no relevance at all on the Kidsmart event but I really love that show). When my kids had study hall at night, I had study hall at night. Sometimes I asked the smarter kids on my team to tutor me. My assistants quizzed me on the continents, (there’s definitely seven of them), solar system, the elements, and current events, (why is Justin Beiber so popular?).
When the big day came I had a nervous energy best described as what I experience on a typical game day. I made sure I put on lots of deodorant, (never let them see you sweat), and I headed over to the Pageant for the event. I knew it was my night when I found a parking spot right in front of the Pageant. I checked out my competition in the green room before we went on stage. I knew that Eric Brewer wouldn’t be a problem as long as he kept getting US History questions, (he’s Canadian. Get it?), but when I saw Ozzie Smith & Ralph Butler I got a little nervous. Both are returning champions from years past. They are like the UCONN of Kidsmart. But what kind of coach would I be if I got deterred by the competition? Bring it on Ozzie!
My partner Reggie from Emerson and I proved to be the perfect combination. He knew the questions I didn’t, (which were pretty much all of them except for the names of Obama’s daughters. Sasha and Malia thank you very much.), and I answered them confidently and in my best coaching voice. We didn’t even need to use the kids for help, (although we did use that $500 mulligan. Thank you Emerson!) I got a little nervous at the end when I realized that we really had a chance to win this thing. Four years of disappointment was finally coming to an end. All my hard work was coming to fruition. I can’t believe none of my staff or team showed up to bear witness. In the end though, it didn’t matter. I was crowned a winner. And for someone coming off a rough season on the court, it was nice to finally win something this year.
The crown is still strategically placed on my kitchen counter where it will remain for all of eternity. Or until I replace it with a crown from next year’s event. Thank you Kidsmart. Thank you Joe Buck. Thank you Reggie from Emerson. Thank you Barack Obama!
Shimmy Gray-Miller, aka The Winner
Posted by Christy McCutcheon on May 20, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Pictures from KidSmart Night at the Blues Game!
March 28th was KidSmart Night at the Blues game, and we had a LOT of fun and collected tons of supplies for St. Louis’ kids in need. In addition, we sold raffle tickets and “brown mystery bags” that also raised money for our kids. Stay tuned for the amount of money raised and amount of supplies collected, and in the meantime check out these great shots! Huge thanks to Eric Brewer, Blues captain, and his wife Rebecca, for being huge supporters of KidSmart!
Posted by Christy McCutcheon on March 31, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Volunteer Spotlight: Trisha Breckenridge
Name: Trisha Breckenridge
Age: 20
School: Lindenwood University
Major: English, minor in Communications
Interests: Fitness, especially kickboxing, yoga
How long have you been volunteering at KidSmart?
Six months
Why did you choose to volunteer at KidSmart?
“My mom is a teacher, so I already had an interest in helping kids succeed in school. I think KidSmart is really important to our community, and like I’m really making a difference. My roommate is also a volunteer at KidSmart.”
What do you like best about volunteering at KidSmart?
“I love that it directly helps St. Louis’ kids, teachers and schools. The staff and volunteers that work at KidSmart are all so nice, and I love interacting with the teachers who come in to shop. Everyone is really genuine, and you can tell that they all really care about helping the kids that are in need.”
As a child, what school supply was most valuable to you?
“My notebooks. We kept journals throughout the school year, and it’s funny now to look back at them and see the things that I wrote! Having notebooks to use allowed me to be creative, to use my imagination and to express myself.”
Posted by Christy McCutcheon on February 18, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
BIG Thank You to Staples, Target & Paper Plus
KidSmart is beyond excited to announce three HUGE product donations that came in this week from a few of our corporate donors!
Staples sent over tons of office & school supplies for our teachers to take back to their classrooms. In addition, Paper Plus sent over a huge paper donation that will provide for thousands of children. Lastly, Target sent over FIVE TRUCKLOADS of paper.
Our corporate donors help make it possible for St. Louis’ children to have the essential supplies they need to succeed in school. Teachers especially appreciate such generous donations; for their students, KidSmart’s Free Store can mean the difference between completing their assigned work and feeling pride in their accomplishments or facing fundamental obstacles to gaining and applying knowledge.
Again, a BIG thank you from KidSmart and those we serve for your continued support and generosity.
Posted by Christy McCutcheon on February 12, 2010 | comments (0) | Permalink
Read About One of KidSmart’s Supporters!
St. Louis Synergy Service Project
School Supply Drive Results
Thank You for all your Donations!
Greetings!
The Jr. Board has successfully completed their first service project of the year, the “Push for Pencils” school supply drive! Kid Smart received a great donation from the St. Louis Synergy teams and were grateful to see the 3 large boxes of supplies. Here are some fun stats on the drive:
- All six teams participated
- We had an overall 50% participation rate - 49 skaters donated supplies
- A total of 1330 items were collected!
- The two teams that collected the most supplies were the Youth Formation team and the Juvenile team! Way Show your Synergy Service & Team Spirit!
- Thank you to all skaters and their families who participated and a special thank you to Amanda Kennedy for spear heading the drive, to Noelle Kennedy for her support in getting things organized and to Mindy Reichert for delivering the supplies to Kid Smart.
Jr. Board members Kameryn Truman, Amanda Kennedy, Maddie Wise and Olivia Rosemann tallyed and boxed the supplies collected for KidSmart who sponsors Push for Pencils.
KidSmart’s mission is, “To ensure that children and their classrooms in the Greater Metropolitan Saint 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.”
For more information please visit the KidSmart Website
Posted by developer on September 15, 2009 | comments (0) | Permalink
Rohan Woods School Donates 2200 Supplies!
Rohan Woods School asked its students to participate in a school supply drive for KidSmart this semester and their efforts were amazingly successful! Rohan Woods School is a private school in St. Louis for children in Pre-Kindergarten through 6th grade. Together, the students from Rohan Woods collected over 2,200 school supplies for KidSmart, and we are so thankful for their support!
After their drive concluded, Christy and Connie (KidSmart Staff) visited Rohan Woods School to collect the supplies, meet the kids, and thank them for their donation. Christy also took a moment to explain to the some of the students that their donations would help SIX to SEVEN classrooms by providing them with school supplies. Hearing this gave the students of Rohan Woods an amazing sense of pride and accomplishment. Overall, this was an great drive and experience for all involved.
THANK YOU Rohan Woods School!!
Posted by Shirey on March 16, 2009 | comments (0) | Permalink