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CHARLOTTE – It will take just over $12 million to make sure every student in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools comes to school prepared. And no one sees that need more than Classroom Central, a store that provides free school supplies to teachers at 132 schools.

Workers at Classroom Central say they need the community’s help to open an extra day.

The number of teachers coming to the store is up from 360 a week last year to 390 every week this year. The store is open three days a week for them to get what they need, but they say they need to open another shopping day.

Though Classroom Central fills a big need, Executive Director Karen Calder still expects there to be a large gap in the amount of school supplies that they’re able to provide. This year, she expects the cost to buy school supplies for needy students to be around $17 million.

But Classroom Central will only be able to provide about $4.8 million in supplies. Meanwhile, many teachers spend as much as $1,000 of their own money to buy supplies.