Kay kay DeRossette and Rob Pyron pose for a photo in the fall. The PACK the Bus drive sill start after spring break.
Phillp Waller I The Daily Mississippian
The 2013-14 Mr. and Miss Ole Miss will be leading a school supplies drive on campus as a service project for underperforming public schools in Mississippi. The drive will begin the week after the spring break holiday, from March 17-22.
Mr. Ole Miss, Rob Pyron, and Miss Ole Miss, Kay Kay DeRossette, came together to create a service project they call PACK the Bus, in which PACK stands for Promoting Access to College for Kids. Pyron and DeRossette will have a school bus parked in front of the Student Union to encourage students to fill the bus with school supplies that will be donated to the North Panola School District. North Panola Conservator Bob King said he is thrilled for the much-needed help PACK the Bus will bring to his students.
“I was excited about the initiative,” King said. “It provided our people an opportunity to give back to a school district that maybe doesn’t have quite as much as the surrounding schools. It’ll have a far-reaching impact on the students we serve.”
According to Pyron, he and DeRossette came up with the school drive as an effective and essential way of giving back to their home state.
“We’re both from Mississippi and we realize how poor and failing our education system is, so we wanted to try to help that,” said Pyron, a senior public policy leadership senior from Crystal Springs. “We wanted to help students that haven’t had the same access to supplies that we had.”
PACK the Bus will end on March 22, the same day as The University of Mississippi’s Big Event. Pyron and DeRossette have been working with Madison Coburn, who is in charge of the Big Event and has agreed to allow PACK the Bus to have boxes and let students bring school supplies to the event. North Panola School District officials will pick the bus up the same day. Upon examination of the quantity of supplies they have, they will distribute the supplies throughout the district.
Pyron encourages all students, regardless of whether they bring supplies or not, to attend the Big Event as well.
“People will be working and volunteering to pack the bus as full as possible,” he said. “We’re going to encourage all students to take part in the event when they come to volunteer that morning to drop off school supplies.”
Pyron thanked Valerie Ross, associate dean of students for multicultural affairs and volunteer services at Ole Miss, who helped organize the committee for PACK the Bus and generate ideas to reach out to different people to get different groups on campus involved.
“We’d really like to offer our thanks to her,” Pyron said. “She is the one who guided us in the right direction.”
According to the PACK the Bus Web page, the following are some of the supplies requested: pens, pencils, notebook paper, folders, glue, construction paper, rulers, protractor, eraser, note cards, tissues, crayons, colored pencils, markers and hand sanitizer.
King said he is very thankful for Ole Miss’ desire to help those in need in Oxford and its surrounding areas.
“I appreciate Ole Miss and its commitment to this particular school district,” King said. “It’s an opportunity for students to reach out and help a district that has a number of needs.”
