A Copiah-Lincoln Community College honor society is seeking helpfrom the public to gather educational supplies for the upcomingschool year.

Phi Theta Kappa’s Etta Omega chapter at Co-Lin is conducting a”Back to School Supply Drive” for area children in need. The supplydrive is targeted for students in elementary and middle school.

“If you have a third-grader, whenever you go to Wal-Mart we’djust love for you to buy times two,” said Co-Lin Academic CounselorErin Williamson Smith.

Smith said the supply drive is aimed at items such as notebookpaper, spiral notebooks, pens and pencils, crayons and markers andany supplies needed for approximately grades K-6.

“Whatever you would fill your child’s backpack with,” she said.”Well take whatever we can get.”

Supplies may be donated to PTK at the Exchange Club Fair onMonday, July 28. The organization will be hosting a booth at thefair from 5 to 8 p.m.

Those who will not able to attend the fair but still wish todonate to the supply drive may bring their items to Co-Lin’sCounseling Center by Friday, Aug. 1.

Smith said the supply drive would be the first of its kind to behosted by PTK. It is being conducted as a new means to meet theorganization’s philanthropic ends. The idea was taken from a PTKdrive that gathered supplies for victims of Hurricane Katrina.

Co-Lin’s PTK chapter and its roughly 200 members are among thetop 25 of 1200 chapters internationally when it comes to donations,Smith said.

“We have a pretty strong chapter, and to have a strong chapter,you have to have heart,” she said. “We thought this would be a goodway to give back to the community.”