VALLEY — With the summer halfway over, the time when Greater Valley Area kids will be heading back to school is just around the corner.

To help them get prepared for the school year, the local TCC Verizon retailer will be giving out 220 backpacks filled with school supplies as part of the TCC School Rocks Backpack Giveaway.

The company has been doing this giveaway annually since 2013 at all their nationwide stores and has given out a total of 752,000 backpacks to kids who could use them.

“This is part of TCC’s Culture of Good, we like to give back to our local communities,” said Taylor Peacock, professional wireless consultant at the Valley TCC.

According to a press release from the company, families with school-aged children plan to spend an average of $687 each — a total of $29.5 billion — on school supplies this year. TCC gives out the backpacks every year to help alleviate this year’s eight percent increase in cost of these supplies through their annual program.

“We are thrilled to support the education of our youth in our communities,” said Scott Moorehead, CEO of Round Room, parent company of TCC. “By providing families across the country with essential school supplies, we’re easing the back-to-school shopping burden and helping set children up for success.”

On July 22, families can come down to the TCC location at 3001 20th Ave. W in Valley from 1 p.m. until 5 p.m. to pick up one stuffed backpack per child.

According to Peacock, families can stick around to enjoy Big Momma’s Ice Cream, a Fire Truck and a D.A.R.E. car.

“It’s going to be a really fun time and a way for us to give back to the Valley community,” he said. “I feel it’s really important because we aren’t a Verizon corporate location, we are a premium retailer which means that we are a local business. We want to foster good faith in the community because we want our customers to shop locally instead of going online or going somewhere else.”