The International Falls School District has an opportunity to win $10,000 worth of school supplies, and needs the community’s help.
The district’s parent involvement committee has enrolled the Falls schools in the national Avery Give Back to Schools promotion. The contest is based on how many online votes a school receives. The committee is encouraging community votes in the contest that runs through Sept. 14.
The Falls district’s ranking has been fluctuating between 100 and 150 over the past week, out of more than 1,200 schools across the nation registered for the contest. Individuals can vote on a daily basis, once per day. For more information or to vote, visit http://givebacktoschools.avery.com/schools/index.
“Supplies get used throughout the year and need to be restocked constantly,” said Terry Mason, co-chair of the parent involvement committee and West End Elementary School Title I reading and math teacher. “We’re trying to ease the teacher load of having to replace them out-of-pocket, and that could easily be attained through this contest.”
Prizes for the contest include Box Top for Education coupons, which students also collect from tops of cereal boxes and Boise Inc. paper products and turn in for cash for their schools.
“The children collect box tops all year round, and they have for many years,” Mason said. “This is just a chance to get a much larger sum of cash to purchase school supplies.”
At the end of the Avery Give Back to Schools contest, the top five schools will receive 25,000 Box Top for Education coupons, $10,000 worth of Avery school supplies and $1,000 worth of gift cards. The 25 runner-up schools will receive 10,000 Box Top for Education coupons, and 10 random winners with more than 100 votes will receive 5,000 Box Top for Education coupons.
Mason said it is important to try to increase funds for school supplies in order to give students more tools to learn through visual or tactile methods. Supplies allow teachers to use colors to illustrate a story, for example, she said.
“It puts more interest in the activity,” Mason said. “It’s one less thing to worry about markers drying up or glue going out — or not being able to do a project because you don’t have the supplies.”
She added that since the district does not have an elementary art teacher, supplies are used more in classrooms as elementary grade teachers try to incorporate art into their curriculum.
“Teachers set aside time for art themselves, which sadly can get pushed to the side simply because they do not have the materials,” Mason explained. “We encourage everyone to vote every day.
