POLAND – Holding a new black and pink backpack, Megan Gross surveyed the tables piled with toys, school supplies and daily essentials. Quick and decisive, she tossed items into the backpack with flicks of her wrist.
At 14, she knew what another teenage girl would want.
Pink body wash. Hand sanitizer. Shampoo. A soft stuffed rabbit.
“I know I still like stuffed animals,” she said, pushing the rabbit’s large pink head down into the bag. “Maybe this’ll be for a girlie girl, not a tomboy.”
As they stuffed other backpacks, some of her Poland Spring Academy schoolmates could vaguely imagine why foster kids needed the goodies. Megan, a former foster child whose adoptive mother helped start the annual backpack drive, didn’t have to imagine.
“They should be able to walk in and feel like they’re in a place where they can feel loved,” she said.
For about five years, Poland Spring Academy, a private school for students in pre-kindergarten through grade 12, has spent the fall gathering backpacks, toys and daily necessities for kids entering the Maine foster care system.
Megan’s adoptive mother, Tina Brisbois, had helped to start the backpack drive to participate in USA Weekend Magazine’s national Make A Difference Day.
Brisbois died of pancreatic cancer three years ago. The 65-student school continues the program in her memory.
This fall, dozens of families donated new and used backpacks, toiletries, toys, school supplies and stuffed animals. On Wednesday, six students skipped class to stuff 40 bags.
“To me, it looks like a little kid would really like this backpack,” said 14-year-old Alex Worley, who filled a blue and red Monsters Inc. bag with crayons, red gloves and a tiny plastic soldiers. “I kind of think of myself at that age and think I would have liked that, too.”
Others needed more help.
“What would be a good for a little boy?” asked 7-year-old Angelica Getchell, standing uncertainly before a table piled with toys. With advice, she eventually chose a flashlight and a checkers game.
After, she vowed to raid her own room at home.
“The kids probably need this stuff,” she said. “I might have some stuff I don’t play with anymore.”
On Saturday, this year’s Make A Difference Day, representatives from the Department of Health and Human Services and the Tri-County Foster and Adoptive Association will pick up the backpacks. Some will be given to children already in foster care. Others will be saved for children entering the system.
There are more than 390 children in foster care in Androscoggin, Oxford and Franklin counties.
“Most of the kids who come into a home come with nothing. They have no stuffed animals, no toothbrush or toothpaste, all of these things we take for granted,” said Donna Warren, president of the tri-county association.
Alex Worley hoped the packs would give foster kids something more.
“We want to help orphans feel more at home, more important, just so they feel more safe,” he said.
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