SYLACAUGA, Ala. – BRIDGES children and staff met outside T.J. Maxx Tuesday afternoon to present thank you cards to the store manager after the clothing store invested $10,000 to SAFE at its ribbon cutting ceremony on March 18.
SAFE showed its appreciation by presenting thank you cards from some of the students and parents for this generous donation.
Sheri Smith, the Project Manager for the BRIDGES after-school programs, said this donation has meant the world to everyone at SAFE. The donation allows the students to have access to science and engineering projects, art activities, field trips, and many more things they would not have access to.
“We are running a summer program for six weeks, Monday through Friday, 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. every week. This donation means a lot for planning 10 hour days and keeping the kids on-task,” said Smith.
“On behalf of T.J. Maxx, I would just like to say it is a pleasure and honor to invest in the youth of our community,” said Store Manager Shane Cash. “We always want to be sure that whatever community we plant a store into that we become part of that community and invest in it. We invested in SAFE because they are so deeply rooted in the community with programs like BRIDGES. We look forward to the ability to maybe volunteer our time later on down the road. Anything we can do to help benefit the community.”
BRIDGES is SAFE’s afterschool program covering four schools in three districts (BRIDGES Indian Valley for 2nd – 8th grade; BRIDES NLMS for the middle school; BRIDGES Comer and BRIDGES Houston (Houston Elementary School in Talladega.) Each of the programs have a very comprehensive curriculum each afternoon after school and also meet during the summer.