Back to school is almost here, and local children are soaking up the last days of summer.

Soon, parents and children will be scouring store aisles buying folders, pencils and highlighters to ensure that students have everything they need to go back to class and start the school year right.

While the end of summer is always a sad time, something is exciting about back to school time. When I was still in school, back to school was a time to reinvent yourself, reconnect with friends and the start of a busy social schedule between sports and other extracurricular activities.

While school days may be long past for our staff at Leader Publications, we still get excited for back to school. For us, the best part of back to school is the opportunity to see and write stories about everything all of the great things that are happening in our schools.

If you are a regular reader of Leader Publications’ products, you know that every Tuesday, the back page of the Niles Daily Star and Dowagiac Daily News feature photos or a story about our schools. We might run a photo package of a unique project or event taking place at the schools. We might write up a story about an excelling student, a new project, or a feature on a teacher who won an award or is using innovative techniques in the classroom. The options are virtually endless so long as the back page showcases our schools.

With school days around the corner, we know that an abundance of these stories will be coming out. However, we cannot find every one of them on our own. We want to tell these stories and make sure they are heard, which is why we need your help.

When you hear a story about a student helping out another student, a teacher hosting a fundraiser, a dedicated parent putting on a food drive or a class winning a contest, we want to hear from you.

When you hear of something happening in your schools that you think deserves coverage, you can email us at news@leaderpub.com to let us know. Your suggestion might just end up on the back page of Tuesday’s paper.

So, please, put us on your back to school checklist, and together we can celebrate our schools, teachers and students.