Tippecanoe Valley School is looking for individuals to adopt families through the Miracle Tree program. 

AKRON — Anyone looking for a way to give back this Christmas season can sponsor a needy family within the Tippecanoe Valley School Corporation through the Miracle Tree program.

Trees have been set up at Bell Memorial Public Library in Mentone and also Akron Carnegie Public Library in Akron. Miracle Tree has been a holiday staple in the Rochester community for more than a decade thanks to the Mill Creek Missionary Church, but because of an increase in the amount of people from the Tippecanoe Valley area seeking assistance, the decision was made this year to expand the program.

“Some people don’t realize we’ve divided it up by school district as opposed to just a Fulton County tree like we’ve done in the past,” said Darren Parker, an instructor at Tippecanoe Valley High School and a member of Mill Creek Missionary Church.

Families who have expressed an interest in receiving help this year were assigned a number. Those numbers were then placed on ornaments and hung on trees in Bell Memorial and Akron Carnegie public libraries. The number lets a potential sponsor know how many children are in the family and their ages.

As of Nov. 15, 107 families in the Tippecanoe Valley area have requested to be placed in the Miracle Tree program.

If a person, business or organization is interested in sponsoring a family, they simply take an ornament from the tree and give it to the circulation desk at either library. The sponsor is then provided a wish list for that family with items the children might want for Christmas.

“It’s all geared towards kids. We get a lot of requests for winter coats, boots, and toys,” said Parker.

Sponsors wrap the gifts they purchase and then return them back to the same library from which they selected the family. To avoid any confusion, there are specific instructions on each wish list on how to mark the gift after it has been wrapped so organizers know which gift belongs to which family and child.

Gifts must be returned to the libraries by Dec. 9. There is no limit to the amount of money a sponsor can spend on a family.

“We would just encourage people that if they’re willing to spend more, that they take one of the families with more kids. Those are the tougher ones a lot of times for us to have sponsored,” said Parker.

Gifts will be distributed to each family on a special night in December. The church will cater a meal and provide activities for the children.