Students sweating over classes this semester can donate unwanted blankets and sleeping bags to Project Bag'It, a program to benefit the homeless in State College sponsored by the Association of Residence Hall Students and Residence Hall Programs.

Starting Monday, collection boxes will be set up outside area government offices in residence hall commons and outside the ARHS office in 101C HUB for students to bring in spare blankets or sleeping bags, said ARHS adviser Dane Foust.

ARHS and RHP will accept donations through Jan. 22 and will distribute them Jan. 22-26.

Foust introduced the idea to ARHS and RHP after he saw a similar program at the Westinghouse High School in Pittsburgh, he said. Local student organizations wanted to deal with the immediate needs of State College's homeless and welcomed Foust's suggestion.

"Students don't realize that in an academic community there are homeless people," said Kim Schriver, a Pollock area representative of ARHS.

The homeless in State College are "very invisible," Foust agreed. Resources, such as soup kitchens and transient hotels, are less available in rural areas such as State College than in an urban setting, pushing the homeless here into the background, he said.

ARHS and RHP will go through community service agencies like the Salvation Army and area churches to locate the homeless.

Foust said the sponsors will further distribute blankets and sleeping bags to people in State College and surrounding areas who cannot afford to heat their homes sufficiently.

Sponsors will give any extra blankets collected to homeless people in Harrisburg, addressing concern over a transient hotel that recently closed there.

Balfurd's Drycleaning Company has pledged to dryclean donated blankets and sleeping bags, he said, and the University's Housing and Food Services will launder any blankets that do not need to be drycleaned.

Hill's Department Store has promised to donate any blankets returned since Christmas that cannot be resold, Foust said.

The project's sponsors have also contacted area churches, asking members to donate, he said.

Foust said he expects the project to be a success because "a lot of people get really altruistic over the holiday season."

The project has already collected about 10 blankets and sleeping bags, he added.