Asian American Students in Foster Families to Receive New Backpacks and School Supplies for the New School Year

Korean American Family Services
Volunteers busily packed backpacks with school supplies on Saturday to give to children in foster homes. |

Korean American Family Services
(Photo : Courtesy of Korean American Family Services)
Volunteers busily packed backpacks with school supplies on Saturday to give to children in foster homes.

The office of the Korean American Family Services (KFAM) in Los Angeles was alive with noise on Saturday morning as volunteers were gathered to fill 300 backpacks with school supplies for the organization's second annual backpack drive.

20 volunteers from KFAM, the Global Children Foundation, Hope & Talent Share Friends, as well as individual volunteers, lovingly packed the backpacks with various school supplies, including notebooks, binders, rulers, glue sticks, crayons, pens, pencil cases, and more.

The backpack drive is significant for students as it prevents students from facing social conflicts in the beginning of the school year.

"Students who start the school year with ragged backpacks or old school supplies are often treated badly by other peers, or even bullied," said Estée Song, the project manager of the Korean Foster Family Initative (KFFI) of KFAM at a press conference in early July.

KFAM fundraised and gathered support for the backpack drive during the month of July, and received donations from individual donors, as well as corporations and organizations including BBCN, the Global Children Foundation, Open Bank, Prisma Fashion School, Charis Church, and The Outdoor Recreation Group. Each set of backpack and school supplies cost about $50, which brings an estimate of $15,000 in funds raised total for this year's backpack drive. Of note, the Global Children Foundation donated $2,000 towards the effort.

The backpacks will be given to Asian American students in the foster care system in West Covina's Asian unit of the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) on August 6th at the DCFS West Covina office. Approximately 60 Korean American students are under the care of the LA DCFS.