Say Yes Buffalo and State Senator Tim Kennedy kicked off the annual drive for dorm room supplies. WBFO’s senior reporter Eileen Buckley says the community is encouraged to donate items for some of the neediest Say Yes scholars as they prepare for college this fall.
“There is nothing too big and there is nothing too small – the more the merrier,” stated Senator Kennedy.
Senator Kennedy is proud to support this collection effort for their third year in a row.
Many of the Buffalo Public and city charter school students headed to college, through Say Yes scholarships, already live in extreme poverty. Say Yes says approximately 50-percent of their students have combined family incomes of below $25,000 dollars and 70-percent are below $55,000.
Kennedy said that is why this dorm collection drive is so important for city students.
“We want to make sure that these individuals, that have worked so hard to get through high school and have taken advantage of such an important and extraordinary program, have the ability to hit the ground running once they get to college campuses across the United States because of the Say Yes Education Foundation,” Kennedy remarked.
The ‘Dorm Room Survival Kit & School Supplies Drive’ is a chance to collect basic living items for the new college students such as bedding, laundry soap and personal care items.
“But the things that they don’t think about as part of their tuition, room and board – the little things – the toiletries, the dorm room bedsheets or pillow cases or pillows themselves, blankets even that are donated that come to the cost in the tune of potentially over $1,000 per student,” explained Kennedy.
Kennedy tells WBFO News the drive has been very successful in the last two-years.
“It’s been a couple of hundred individuals have benefited from the Dorm Room Survival Kit program that we started. It has been donations by the thousands that have come in from all across Western New York," Kennedy replied.
You can drop off items at a number of locations in the Buffalo region:
- Senator Tim Kennedy's Office – 2239 South Park Ave.
- Say Yes Buffalo's Office – 712 Main St.
- City Hall – 65 Niagara Square.
- Assemblyman Sean Ryan’s Office – 936 Delaware Ave.
- Erie County Legislator Barbara Miller-Williams' Office – 427 William St.
- Rich Products Corporation – 1 Robert Rich Way
- Cazenovia Neighborhood Library – 155 Cazenovia St.
- Larkin Square, Main Lobby – 726 Exchange St.
- North Buffalo Community Center – 203 Sanders Rd.
- CAO: Masten Resource Center – 1423 Fillmore Ave.
- Child & Family Services – 844 Delaware Ave.
- Mount Moriah Missionary Baptist Church – 400 Northampton St.
- St. Paul’s Episcopal Church – 4275 Harris Hill Rd.
Northwest Savings Bank – 7 locations
1248 Abbott Rd.3150 Sheridan Dr.
3517 Union Rd.
1531 Niagara Falls Blvd.
364 Connecticut St.
690 Kenmore Ave.
