Photo courtesy of The Circle of Love Foundation
The Hoover-based Circle of Love Foundation this week kicked off its 2023 campaign to provide back-to-school supplies for needy children in Alabama, Tennessee and Virginia.
The goal for this year’s Backpacks for Success campaign is to collect enough money and school supplies to fill backpacks for 550 children — an increase of 50 from 2022, the organization said. With school supply costs averaging $142 for elementary school students and $127 for high school students this year, it should take about $70,000 to $78,000 to meet this year’s goal.
According to the National Retail Federation, families with children in elementary through high school last year planned to spend an average of $864 on back-to-school items, including $139.56 on school supplies, $168.11 on shoes, $363.63 on clothing and accessories and $293.05 on electronics and computer-related equipment. The $864 total from the 2022 survey was $168 higher than the total from 2019, and national averages for 2023 are expected to be even higher when they come out later this summer.
The Circle of Love Foundation focuses only on school supplies. The backpacks with supplies are given to children living in shelters or other children in need. The foundation focuses on children in Alabama, Tennessee and Virginia because those are the states in which the founder’s company, RealSource Title Insurance and Real Estate Closings, operates.
The founder is Doris Phillips, a Hoover resident who is president of RealSource and chief operating officer of Lake Homes Realty and Beach Homes Realty, all of which are based in Hoover’s Meadow Brook Corporate Park.
Phillips grew up in poverty outside of Birmingham and, as a single mom at age 16, worked multiple jobs to feed her child. She said she knows the deep pain of being forgotten and going to school without the basic items needed for success and is committed to prevent it from happening to other children.
Since she founded The Circle of Love Foundation in 2004, the nonprofit has provided back-to-school supplies and Christmas gifts for more than 9,000 needy children. Regions Bank is a sponsor of this year’s backpack campaign.
This year’s Backpacks for Success campaign runs through July 31. To donate or for more information, go to thecircleoflove.org/back-to-school-supplies-drive. There are options to give a monetary donation to the foundation as a whole or to purchase school supplies through Amazon. Donors can choose in which state they wish their donation to be used.
