Tom’s of Maine Giving for Goodness

By Kelton Brooks  | PENCIL Content Writer

Supplying the needs of teachers is the the goal and again that goal was achieved thanks to the Tom’s of Maine Giving for Goodness at the LP PENCIL Box on Thursday.

PENCIL was selected for the Tom’s of Maine and Kids In Need Foundation event where we were donated 10 pallets with 100 backpacks each to distribute to teachers. The backpacks were stuffed with a galore of folders, notebooks, notebook paper, pencils, pens, markers, glue sticks, erasers and a pencil bag. We also had and thank the volunteers from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee to help distribute the backpacks.

PENCIL was ecstatic to welcome 35 Metro Nashville Public School teachers from seven surrounding elementary schools who had either shopped at the LP PENCIL Box before or visited for the very first time. The MNPS teachers were also able to shop in the LP Pencil Box for additional supplies, such as copy paper, cleaning supplies, books and toys.

The teachers also wrote heartfelt thank you letters to express their gratitude to Tom’s of Maine for their giving goodness and what it means to have supplies from PENCIL and Tom’s of Maine made available specifically to them.

Some teachers expounded on the opportunity:

“It’s great. It helps with what we’re teaching in the class and having extra supplies helps the students learn. It’s a great feeling that people want to give back to us and back to the students who may be less fortunate.”

Laura Newman, 1st grade teacher at Charlotte Park Elementary 

“I think it’s a really great opportunity because I see a lot of our teachers spending their own money, so it’s a sigh of relief to be able to give our students supplies on site versus telling them to wait until tomorrow because we have to go to Walmart to buy it. Now we have it ready and available on hand. It puts a smile on our kids’ faces that they’re prepared and don’t have to be judged because they don’t have school supplies. We appreciate this opportunity for our kids.”

Allison Simpson, Community and School Site Coordinator at Amqui Elementary

“I think anyone in the education field will tell you that they need all the education support they can get. For anybody to offer any kind of help, it just shows that people actually care about education. If you watch the news or been in the school, you can see there are things that people need a lot of help with. Having these kinds of opportunities is always welcomed for people in the education field.”

Jason Sales, Preschool, Pre-K, Kindergarten Teacher at Hull-Jackson Elementary

“I think this is important. Education is one of the more profound experiences a child can have. If they don’t have the resources, they are not going to be successful. So, if a teacher has to go in their own pocket to be able to supply those things when they are already giving so much, it makes us happy to donate supplies and volunteer our time.”

Claire Brulatour, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee Volunteer