Back 2 School Alliance Volunteers Fills 4,000 Backpacks for Bloomington-Normal Students
Payton Wahlsmith volunteers putting school supplies in backpacks for the Back 2 School Alliance on July 28, 2025, at Midwest Food Bank.
Reposted from The Pantagraph
Story by Mateusz Janik; Photos by Clay Jackson
NORMAL — With the new school year approaching, students are going to need sharpened pencils, fresh crayons, bright highlighters and maybe even new backpacks.
However, for some families, buying new supplies for their students is not in their budget.
“There is nothing sadder in the whole world than having a little 6-year-old show up and realize that they don’t have what other students have,” said Jan Meadows, chairwoman of the Back 2 School Alliance. “I want them to have their own.”
Community volunteers have been working hard these past few weeks to collect school supplies, host supply drives and fill backpacks at the Midwest Food Bank for the 2025 Back 2 School Alliance supply giveaway.
Volunteers work to fill backpacks with school supplies for the Back 2 School Alliance at Midwest Food Bank.
The alliance is planning to give away around 4,000 backpacks filled with new school supplies to eligible students entering prekindergarten through eighth grade at Bloomington District 87 and McLean County Unit 5 schools.
This year’s giveaway will be take place from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 7, set up as a drive-thru in the east parking garage of State Farm Corporate South, 3 State Farm Plaza in Bloomington.
Students who qualify for free and reduced lunch and have completed all registration requirements for school are eligible to participate in the school supply giveaway.
This year, rather than receiving a letter in the mail, families will receive an electronic form via email to sign up.
“Our goal is to make sure all of our students in Unit 5 and District 87 are ready on day one,” Meadows said. “We like to support our families by then offering them as many free school supplies as we can pull together from the community.”
Meadows, who is retired school teacher from Unit 5, said she there were many times when she would spend her lunch break running over to the nearest store to buy schools supplies for kids who didn’t have what they needed.
About 16 years ago, she decided to dedicate herself to the Back 2 School Alliance, which was initially founded in 1999, and helped organize the nonprofit to where they know collect supplies a year in advance and have a bank account set up to cover the cost.
Volunteer Liz Heidemann works to prepare backpacks filled with school supplies for the Back 2 School Alliance at Midwest Food Bank.
Liz Heidemann, Meadows’ daughter and a speech pathologist at Unit 5, was among the volunteers helping to pack school supplies this week.
“I feel like I’ve just carried it over into my own career with always helping out,” she said Monday. “It’s just wonderful and I love being there at the event. It’s my favorite day of the year.”
Heidemann said she has seen the nonprofit grow and change from its humble beginnings and adapt to new challenges, like when they started to host the giveaway as a drive-thru rather than a party to adapt to the requirements of the COVID-19 pandemic.
More and more people across the community have shown their support for the Back 2 School as they how important it is for students and families. The Bloomington-Normal community continues to show they are more than happy to volunteer their time or money to donate supplies, Heidemann said.
“We just keep growing and growing every year,” she said. “Seeing the first kid get their backpack, that kid is so excited to see that great new backpack and all their brand new supplies that they probably weren’t going to get. That makes it all worth it.”
Assembled backpacks with a variety of school supplies for the Back 2 School Alliance.
Jimmy Beach, who along with other employees from local area Walmart stores, volunteered for the first time this year and said he was glad to see the interest among others to come together to help students in need.
Beach said he had heard about the alliance before but did not realize how big of an operation they had until he started volunteering and saw the mounds of supplies. He said that really put everything into perspective and highlighted the importance even more.
“It’s a lot, and I’m glad that people can come together like this to help kids in need,” Beach said. “Doing this kind of community work is nice and refreshing and makes you feel good for doing your part.”
People can donate to support the Back 2 School Alliance online or directly to Illinois Prairie Community Foundation with “backpacks” written on the memo line. IPCF serves as fiscal sponsor for the Back 2 School Alliance.