Sweet chance to spread SUGAR in Manatee County

Kennedy Burnette, a sophomore at Lakewood Ranch High School, picked up a small pink backpack and made her way down the line of Slim Jims, SpaghettiOs and cereal.

She then went to the table of toys and added an emoji keychain, stickers, a scrunchie and more.

Afterward, she wrote a personal note to the elementary student in Manatee County who would receive the backpack for the holidays.

“I’m glad to get out and do something for my community and give kids something to look forward to coming up to the holidays,” Burnette said.

Burnette, along with about 20 other volunteers, helped stuff 250 backpacks with snacks and toys as part of the Be a Hero Project by nonprofit Showing Unconditional Goodwill And Respect. SUGAR is a children-focused volunteer organization.

Through the project, kids and families throughout the greater Lakewood Ranch area are coming together to stuff backpacks for students experiencing homelessness in pre-K through 12th grade in the School District of Manatee County.

Country Club’s Susan Meyers, one of the organizers of Be a Hero Project, said there are more than 1,200 homeless students within the school district.

“One thing that I thought was remarkable is that there’s not a single school in Manatee County that is exempt from this,” Meyers said. “Even our schools in Lakewood Ranch have students who fall into this category.”

Project organizers shared the statistic with volunteers during the project’s first service event Nov. 15 at Summerfield Community Park.

“It’s crazy thinking about how kids sitting next to me in class could possibly be homeless,” Burnette said.

With so many students in need, the project is starting with elementary students by donating 250 backpacks during the holidays.

Greenbrook’s Stephanie Guido, one of the creators of SUGAR, hopes volunteers can help assemble backpacks for middle school students to be donated in February followed by high school students at the end of the school year.

Greyhawk Landing’s Payal Shah volunteered with her two daughters, Hailey and Marlie Brooks, as a way to teach them about giving back to their communities.

“So many people have suffered so much loss financially and health wise,” Shah said. “If there is one little thing we can do to put a smile on people’s faces, we’re going to do it.”

SUGAR, much like dozens of other nonprofits, has had to make some adjustments to its service events as a result of the pandemic. Usually, its service events are held on a larger scale with dozens of volunteers, but organizers are limiting Be a Hero Project events to 25 volunteers.

As a result, the nonprofit is receiving help from other community organizations interested in assisting, such as Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts troops, Future Business Leaders of America clubs at school and sports teams.

Each group will be given a set of backpacks, and the organizations will fill them and return them to SUGAR. 

All the supplies for the backpacks come from donations within the community.

“This community as a whole is so spectacular,” Guido said. “They are the most philanthropic, the most generous, the most compassionate minded. It’s unbelievable the way they rally.”

The pandemic caused some concern for whether there would be enough donations to fill the bags because organizers knew people in the community were hurting from the financial strain put on them by COVID-19.

“When it’s donations, you have no idea what is going to arrive at your door,” Guido said. “We knew going into it that we had to budget, and we gave an allowance for each kid. We knew at the bare minimum, they would have something even if we had to pack it ourselves.”