For the 2016 St Thomas of Villanova Day of Service the university’s women’s field hockey team helped The Joy of Sox® with a special project (pictures below). The Joy of Sox is a nonprofit with the simple mission of providing joy to the homeless by giving them socks. They receive a lot of their donations of new socks from sock drives conducted at schools and companies.
On Saturday September 24, 2016 members of Villanova University’s women’s field hockey team spent the morning signing letters and writing personalized notes to 174 Philadelphia area schools. The letters and notes, along with several handouts about The Joy of Sox will be mailed to the schools suggesting that the they consider holding a sock drive as a school community service project.
In 2015, a similar project by Villanova students, resulted in about 25,000 pairs of new socks being donated and distributed to the homeless. This year the goal is 30,000+.
Since the homeless rarely receive donations of new socks the outcome of this effort can have a tremendous positive impact on the daily lives of the homeless.
This model can be duplicated in other cities across the country. If anyone is interested in starting a similar campaign in their area please check out The Joy of Sox’s website, and in particular the page about conducting a sock drive. And also contact Tom Costello Jr, Chief Sock Person, by email or by calling 610-688-33318 (eastern time zone).