By Evelyn Wall

SPECIAL TO THE NEWS-HERALD

 

Students had a head start gathering school supplies for this year at the fourth annual Back to School Jump-Off held at the East Suffolk Recreation Center on Aug. 27.

Event Coordinator Tempestt Boone, along with members of the “757 Crew,” hosted the giveaway event, which included games, food and line dancing for all ages. The 757 Crew is a collaboration of local soul line dancing groups across the Hampton Roads area that provides classes and promotes line-dancing events. Boone herself is a member of the BAC Sliders line dance group of Hampton.

“Tempestt is a hard worker and a great motivator. She is the kind of person that when she heads something, she wants it done successfully,” said Mark Wall, a member of the East Suffolk Sophisticated Steppers.

Members of the 757 Crew supervised more than 15 games during the event, including the inflatable ring toss, Frisbee tic-tac-toe and hoops. Each participant had the opportunity to win tickets during the games. Afterwards, participants traded in their accumulated tickets for various school supplies, which included pencils, notebooks, binders and more. The most popular game was the book bag walk, a game similar to musical chairs in which the winner received a backpack. At the end of the event, every participant left with a school supply.

Vee Alston, an assistant instructor of the East Suffolk Sophisticated Steppers, said she hopes the event can grow in the future to attract major sponsors so that it can serve even more students in the area.

Volunteer Polo LikeNu kept the grill operating outside, and each child and parent had hotdogs, a bag of potato chips and a drink.

To entertain parents sitting on the bleachers, 757 Crew members not conducting games performed line dances with music played by DJ Pleasure. To conclude the event, Vee Alston and Tony Brown taught parents and students a beginner line dance to demonstrate how easy it was to perform certain dance steps.

The 757 Crew hosted a similar event in Norfolk the very next day.

“We may get a little tired when we are doing this, but in the end we get joy out of providing the future generation school supplies to show them how much we care about their efforts in securing a good education and to make parents’ financial load in purchasing their children’s supplies a little lighter,” Boone said.