SANDY, Utah — As students get ready to head back to school, one school district is making sure K-12 kids don't have to worry about beginning the new year without the necessities.
The Canyons School District began distributing items out of their resource closet earlier this year.
"We started in January 2023 and has served up just about 200 families," said Kirsten Stewart, Associate Director of Communications for Canyons School District.
Stewart says they have about 33,000 students in the district and 25% of them are economically disadvantaged. Stewart says that equates to more than 8,000 students.
She says 2,000 students in the district are without fixed reliable housing.
"We know that housing costs have increased food insecurity is on the rise, so we're expecting increased demand this year," said Stewart. "We want our students focused on learning and succeeding in the classroom, not worrying about where their next meal is coming from, or worried about whether or not they have the back-to-school supplies that they need to succeed in the classroom.
Denise Haycock is the Director of the Canyons Education Foundation.
"We just want to make sure they have everything they need to be able to come to school," said Haycock.
The foundation serves as the fundraising arm for the Canyons School District.
"This is a collaboration between the community facilitators and the education foundation to make sure that we have the products and the items that students need to come back to school," said Haycock.
Haycock walked FOX 13 News through the resource closet on Thursday.
"We have coats of all different sizes, from elementary through adult sizes," said Haycock.
As well as a variety of other items, like backpacks.
"Jeans, shoes of all different sizes and types," said Haycock.
That includes things like non-perishable food items, hygiene products and basic school supplies.
"We have it set up where the teachers can just fill in an online form or the principals fill in an online form, we check the online form and then just ship it right to the school," said Haycock.
While the resource closet is geared towards students and their families in the district, Haycock says it has helped teachers as well.
"It started as just helping the students, but we're always looking at ways to make our teachers' lives easier," said Haycock. "What we love about this is if teachers see a student that needs school supplies, they can reach out to us or if their own classroom, they're seeing that they need glue sticks or scissors or construction paper, they can reach out to us and say, do you have anything extra left over that you can provide to our classroom?"
For information and how you can donate items to the Canyons School District Resource Closet, you can contact foundation.canyonsdistrict.org
Many other schools in the state have resources available for students as well, you can check your district online.
