Stonewater Helps 12 Teachers Get Classroom School Supplies
Stonewater Roofing continued its late summer tradition this year by hand-delivering overloaded boxes of school supplies to East Texas teachers as part of the company’s #ClearTheList campaign. This marks the fourth year that the roofing company has given back to area educators by buying up items on their classroom wish lists.
This was Stonewater Roofing’s biggest school supply drop yet with a total of 12 teachers receiving stacks of books, games, paints, and other learning tools. More than 450 items were delivered to campuses, elementary to high school, from the Longview area to the DFW area.
In order to be considered for the contest, applicants were asked to submit a short video explaining why they — or the teacher who they were nominating — deserved to have their classroom wish list cleared. The following list of winners were selected from those video submissions.
- Deedra Evans, Cheney Hills Elementary School in Richland Hills
- Yessenia Hernandez, East Side Elementary School in Jacksonville
- Michelle Hill, Pine Tree Primary School in Longview
- Sara Loredo, Three Lakes Middle School in Tyler
- Katie Martin, Jacksonville Middle School in Jacksonville
- Jenelle McClure, E.J. Moss Intermediate School in Lindale
- Lauren Moore, Hallsville East Elementary School in Hallsville
- Stephen Niedrauer, Tyler High School in Tyler
- Ashley Poeschl, Stanton-Smith Elementary School in Whitehouse
- Tracee Pouliasis, Truman W. Smith Children’s Care Center in Gladewater
- Shannon Stewart, Boles Junior High School in Arlington
Each teacher had a special story to share with the Stonewater Roofing team. For instance, Hill is a first-year kindergarten teacher after changing careers following a battle with cancer. McClure feels teaching’s financial burden twice as hard each year, because her husband is also an educator in Lindale. Pouliasis works at the only facility in Texas that teams with a public school district to provide in-house education to children suffering from congenital disorders or debilitating injuries.
In addition to those lucky educators, Stonewater Roofing also helped out a member of its own family. Megan Henley is a fourth grade teacher at Bullard Elementary School in Bullard, and the wife of Stonewater Roofing safety manager Rick Henley. “While the contest was being held, we found out about Meg’s own classroom needs,” said COO and co-owner Jacob Law. “It only made sense to help her out as well, and we did so with funds separate from the contest to make sure that it didn’t take away from any of our applicants.”
The #ClearTheList movement began as a social media effort to help educators get necessary school supplies. School districts are unable to keep up with this demand, which forces teachers to purchase materials for their students using money from their own pockets. Many teachers started relying on the kindness of online strangers, posting their Amazon wish lists on social media with the #ClearTheList hashtag. The campaign quickly went viral.
Stonewater Roofing employees delivered all of the school supplies to the winners in the first few weeks of August, just in time for the start of the 2022-2023 school year.