Operation School Bell®
Helps one child at a time.
Operation School Bell helps meet the needs of children in New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender counties.
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Year in Review
2025-2026
Clothing for our students
Warmth and Confidence
Clothing for students is given in a number of ways. We supply closets filled with clothing to schools. Social workers and other school officials distribute these to students who need them. Also, a number of times a year, selected middle school students go to Target to select new clothing and supplies.
Closets for the schools
Schools are given closets that contain items for students.
Each closet may include: pants, leggings, shirts, hooded sweatshirts, underwear, socks, belts, hygiene supplies, school supplies, any special requests from individual school.
Middle school shopping nights at Target
Students from nine middle schools go to Target on special nights throughout the year and shop for clothing, shoes and other necessities.
Operation School Bell is more than just clothing
Other ways we help
Kids and Nurses Assist Program
Backpacks of health room supplies are delivered to school nurses in the schools served by Operation School Bell.
Snacks and Meals
We provide healthy snacks and box drinks in a zip lock bag for assorted afterschool programs. At each of our meetings we pack 300+ bags and NourishNC distributes them to hungry children. Above, our members are packing 1,600 snack packs for our summer packing for NourishNC. We deliver breakfast supplies to Brunswick Family Assistance and food bank supplies to Pender Christian Services in Pender Co.
Stand Out And Read
Every spring we deliver a supply of books to each of our Operation School Bell schools that will give every second, third and fourth grader a choice of a book to read and keep.
Our History
Dressing Children in Need In the Greater Wilmington Area Schools
This national philanthropic program was founded in 1958 with humble beginnings as a clothes closet in a Los Angeles schoolroom after Ruth Ann Montgomery, then a teacher, discovered that members of one family were alternating their days in school because they had to share clothes and there were not enough to go around.
Since then this National signature program has served more than three million children in need. Every one of the 85 Assistance League chapters nationwide has an Operation School Bell program.
Assistance League of Greater Wilmington provided area children with thousands of backpacks full of school clothing, underwear, hygiene kits and books from 2008 until 2019.
When school started in the fall of 2019, we delivered closets for 22 schools in Brunswick, New Hanover and Pender counties. Our volunteer teams work throughout the year with the “wish lists” of the school counselors and social workers to fill and resupply the closets two or three times per year. School counselors identify children who qualify for closet items based on established criteria. They select the needed items from the Assistance League Closet for the child to take home.
When school started in the fall of 2023, elementary and Pre-K school counselors, social workers and parent facilitators were able to go online and order clothing, and school and hygiene supplies from a partner supplier, RightGift.com. Online shopping is available twice a year and school shoppers select items to meet the needs of their designated students. The students keep and take home the clothing or other necessary items.
Middle school students selected by their school counselors or social workers are invited twice a year for a shopping night at Target. Students and their parents or guardians enjoy an evening of shopping for school clothes and school and hygiene supplies using a budget provided by Assistance League and Target.
For many children, these are the first new clothes they have ever worn. We are proud to celebrate our years of continuing services to the children in the Greater Wilmington communities.
Serving New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender counties since 2008