Stellar Seniors

Submitted by Lorraine Lane

Following the lead of the branches,  Outreach is now offering Grab & Go bags to a handful of groups in the community. Currently we are offering Grab & Go bags to:

• City Laundromat
• Head Start
• Mobile Food Pantry
• Mentor Me Mentoring Afterschool (MAS) Program

We are utilizing the same format that the branches are offering, providing a handout promoting books centered on a particular theme, supplemental learning pages based on the age group, and a craft. As you can imagine, assembling over 250 bags each month can be a daunting task! In an effort to involve our seniors in some way, we reached out to activity directors in our senior living facilities to solicit their help.  

We weren’t sure how this initiative would pan out, so we started with a small allotment and quickly learned that even more residents wanted to help out.  The Activities Director at The Villas let us know her volunteers are willing to do even more of the prep work for us! In the end, the residents at The Villas and The Oaks at Post Road assembled more than 125 bags for us in October. We couldn’t be more pleased with their reception.  One resident even approached us at The Villas lobby stop to share that she wasn’t able to help initially but was very interested in subsequent packing parties.  We are now looking into expanding to additional facilities with our November bags.