RICHMOND, Va. — One backpack is a relatively small thing.
Multiply it by more than 35,000, however, and it becomes a statement about what a community believes its children deserve.
The ninth annual Ultimate Backpack Supply Drive in Richmond packed more than 35,000 backpacks with school supplies for Central Virginia students, surpassing the approximately 31,000 packed the previous year.
But behind those numbers were individual people with deeply personal reasons for giving.
Robert Samson brought school supplies in memory of his late wife, who died about eight years ago. Giving had been something she did, Samson told WWBT, and continuing that tradition became a way for him to honor her.
Robert and Kimberly Johnson also showed up with supplies. After Robert saw coverage of the drive, Kimberly recalled, he came upstairs and told her to get dressed because they were going shopping for children’s school supplies.
Their family understands education personally. The couple has helped put several children through school, and their children are now educators.
Throughout the drive, those individual decisions accumulated — backpack after backpack, pencil after pencil, notebook after notebook.
The effort included backpack packing at the Greater Richmond Convention Center followed by a Stuff the Bus collection at a Walmart on Forest Avenue. Supplies gathered through Stuff the Bus will help schools replenish materials throughout the year, while the packed backpacks are delivered directly to schools.
The Heartitude lens here is found not simply in the impressive total, but in the reasons people showed up. A husband kept his late wife’s generosity alive. Parents and grandparents drew on their own experiences. Residents recognized that another family’s financial pressure could become their opportunity to help. That is how “Go Give It” grows from an individual decision into a community culture: one person decides someone else’s child matters, and thousands of small contributions eventually fill a bus.
Organizer Timmy Nguyen said the mission is to relieve some of the financial stress families experience and make sure students have the basic supplies they need for the first day of school.
There is dignity in that goal.
A child walking into a classroom with pencils, notebooks and crayons may never know who purchased them. The donor may never know the child’s name.
Compassion does not always require that connection.
Sometimes it simply asks people to notice the gap between what someone has and what they need — and quietly help close it.
More than 35,000 backpacks later, Richmond offered a compelling answer.
Live with Heartitude. Give what you can, where you can — and Go Give It.