NORWICH – Staff and faculty at the Norwich City School District are teaming up with the Chenango Liberty Partnership Program to bring a little warmth to students for the holiday season.

For more than 30 years, the Norwich City School District has sponsored a clothing drive for its students to provide them with new, seasonably warm, school appropriate attire in time for the holidays. Volunteers set out to collect pants, long-sleeved shirts, coats, hats, gloves, scarves and other clothing items each year in hopes of making the season a little brighter for the area’s most needy families. With Christmas around the corner, the clothing drive is in full swing once again, this time with the help of Liberty Partnership.

“We are hoping for the kindness and generosity of the community to help us out again this year,” said NCSD Social Worker Kelly Colosi, also mentioning that while the district has partnered with other community organization in previous years to make the annual NCSD clothing drive a success, this marks the first time Liberty Partnership has gotten involved. “With our growth with Liberty Partnership, we hope to get more students involved,” she said.

To help in the effort, a Christmas tree decorated with paper snowflakes – each snowflake showing the age, grade and clothing sizes of a student in need – has been set up at the Norwich Walmart. Snowflakes are also available at the main office of the Gibson and Perry Browne elementary schools, and the Norwich middle and high schools. In addition, NCSD and Liberty Partnership are soliciting monetary donations from local businesses and community members that will be used to purchase new clothing.

More than 350 new shirts and 280 pairs of pants were gifted to students last year – an achievement made possible by donations from community organizations and individuals. Additionally, a total $6,075 in monetary donations from local businesses, community members and the RC Smith Foundation helped purchase clothing items to provide for the nearly 209 families that filed requests. Combined efforts provided a total 569 children with new winter clothing.

“We are anticipating a similar number of families to send in requests again this year,” Colosi said.