Thanks to Oxford-Orion FISH, many local students started the new school year with brand-new backpacks brimming with fresh supplies, all free of charge.

The nonprofit organization’s annual School Backpack Drive was a “complete success,” according to Lynn Kennis, a FISH volunteer who helps coordinate the collection and distribution.

FISH was able to stuff 185 backpacks with supplies, ranging from folders and notebooks to pencils and crayons.

Of those, 175 were distributed to Oxford and Lake Orion students. The recipients included 70 elementary students, 55 middle schoolers and 50 high school students, according to Kennis.

“We had a line out the door,” she said.

Ten backpacks were set aside for any new families FISH may add to its client base.

“This seems to be the time of year when people’s seasonal jobs end . . . We get a lot of new families, so we always hold back,” Kennis said.

She noted the annual backpack drive wouldn’t happen without all of the individuals, families, businesses, churches and organizations who contribute to it.

“Our program was 99.9 percent funded (by) donors,” said Kennis, who added “the only cost” to FISH was providing some “manpower.”

“We’re honored and blessed beyond words,” she said.

Many of the donated backpacks were in the $40-to-$50 price range.

“People are just so generous,” Kennis said. “It really brings tears to my eyes. We’re so blessed that we have such a supportive community.”

She’s particularly impressed with a female middle school student who raises money to conduct her own backpack drive for FISH.

“That’s like her summer project. She goes door to door (collecting donations),” Kennis said. “She picks (the backpacks) out, she fills them (with school supplies) and she (leaves) a note in them. This year, she (filled) close to 50.”

Kennis would love to share this young lady’s identity because, in her mind, she deserves to be recognized for her good deeds, but “she doesn’t want her name in the paper.”

“She wants to be anonymous,” said Kennis, because she doesn’t want to make her peers feel uncomfortable or beholden to her in some way.

“That young girl, to me, is an angel on Earth,” she noted. “She’s just this little sweetheart.”

Many of the people who donate are like that middle school student.

“A lot of people bring (in) backpacks and they don’t want any recognition. They don’t want to give their names or take a (receipt for their donations),” Kennis said. “People just really want to help out. It gives me goose bumps. It’s so wonderful.”