A local community organizer donated more than 100 backpacks to LGBTQ youth at a back-to-school event to motivate schoolchildren “to overcome discrimination through education.”
LaTonya Myers organized her second bookbag giveaway event at The Attic Youth Center Aug. 24. She rallied members of the community to fund the backpacks, filled with school supplies and various hygiene products such as deodorant, shampoo and conditioner. Drea Young, founder of the Philadelphia-based entertainment company Nice Rack, hosted two open-mic fundraisers at the Toasted Walnut earlier this summer to raise money for the event.
Myers was a foster child who found her way to The Attic, which, she said, provided a “safe space.” The backpack giveaway provided an opportunity to give back to the community that gave her everything, she said.
“I didn’t have much growing up. I came from some of the same dangerous neighborhoods that some of these kids come from. I’m hoping that they see someone who was once in their footsteps who was able to prosper, come back and give back, and I want to motivate them to do the same,” Myers said.
She started the backpack giveaway when she recalled her own experiences of going to school without any supplies. “I felt discouraged and uncomfortable to go to school.”
The event featured speakers who provided encouraging words of support ahead of the new school year, as well as free haircuts and pizza donated by Pizzeria Cappelli, an LGBTQ-friendly pizza place in the Gayborhood. Myers said the event was a community effort. Guest speakers and Attic members assisted with filling the backpacks.
“I started this event in 2016 when I noticed that other bookbag events were geared toward kids in specific communities, but none for the LGBTQ youth in the city,” Myers said. “I wanted to remind the youth that the LGBTQ community stands with them and will provide them with the support they need to have a successful school year.”
Malcolm Kenyatta — the out Democratic candidate running for state representative in the 181st House District that primarily covers sections of North Philadelphia — was one of the keynote speakers of the event.
Kenyatta told the audience, overflowing with preschool- to high-school-aged children, that “there’s a lot of different pressure pushing you to be some different version of whatever you’re expected to be. I think the most rebellious thing you can do is be yourself in a world that tells you you’re not supposed to be yourself in the way that you were made.”
Wellesley Trainor, a trans-identifying Temple University student who works as a legal intern for the Philadelphia Innocence Project, shared his story of being directionless in high school and using education as a way to find success.
“In my senior year of high school, I found myself homeless. I didn’t have any support from my family and I didn’t have many friends when I came out. I knew that the only way I was going to make something of myself was through education,” Trainor said. “Hopefully this will show these kids that you don’t have to have it all figured out at an early age.”
Carter Cole, a trans man, brought his 6-year-old son to the event to get a backpack, but also used it as a way to spark conversations about his own identity.
“This is a positive event and environment that I wanted to bring my son around so that I can help teach him to be more open-minded,” said Cole. “We haven’t had any talks about how I identify, and I wanted to bring him back to a place that I used to come to when I was a kid so that he can understand this part of me.”