Local nonprofit holding backpack drive for low-income students

Local nonprofit holding backpack drive for low-income students

SCS backpack drive

Sunnyvale Community Services (SCS) is collecting new backpacks for K-12 students through July 19 through its Ready-to-Learn program. This year, SCS hopes to distribute backpacks and school supplies to 2,500 low-income students in Sunnyvale.

Backpacks can be dropped off Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-noon and 12:30-to 4 p.m., at the SCS facility at 1160 Kern Ave.

The nonprofit is also looking for donors and sponsors to help with the effort. For more information, visit https://svcommunityservices.org/events-ready-to-learn.

Social transit hub

A new social media outlet launched this month to keep Bay Area transit riders informed and engaged.

The Discord Project will be housing service alerts from most of the major Bay Area transit agencies, including Valley Transportation Authority, Caltrain, BART, SamTrans AC Transit, and the San Francisco Bay Ferry. All participating agencies will have representatives active on the platform to engage with their respective riders.

An events tab will list both in-person and virtual events from each agency so people can ask questions and coordinate with other transit agencies. Users can learn about and RSVP for events, and keep abreast of developments throughout the Bay Area’s transit systems. Additionally, the server allows transit users to interact with one another, share photos and discuss transit policy.

Later this year, plans are to introduce a feature that auto-populates press releases and blog posts from each participating agency.

Over 1,200 people signed up for the Discord Project in the first 48 hours after it launched on May 11. To join the platform, visit https://discord.com/invite/bayareatransit.