The Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District’s Center for Family Centered Programs has been providing supplies to schoolchildren in need through Project HELP for over a decade, and after funding ran out last year, the program is looking to the community for donations.
Project HELP provides school supplies and hygiene products to children ranging from pre-K to 12th grade in families that are either homeless or displaced.
Office manager Tommie Vance said “homeless” is not just limited to children who are on the street, but can also include families who share a residence with another family, children who have recently moved living situations and even students who are on their own without guardians taking care of them.
Vance has been managing Project HELP since it lost funding. The program was funded by the McKinney-Vento Education for Homeless Children and Youth Grant until it didn’t receive the grant last year. Vance said the district reapplied for the grant, and is hoping to receive funding again this year.
“Right now, we are serving in the neighborhood of 55 to 60 students,” Vance said. “Our goal is to make sure they are in school. We don’t want them missing school because they don’t have what they need.”
This week, alone, Vance has received three referrals for students that might need supplies and Project HELP provided supplies for a family who was displaced after a house fire.
HELPING FAMILIES:
Project HELP recipient Mercedes White brought her 5-year-old granddaughter to live with her in Starkville after her sons were murdered in an armed robbery. Jar-vah White came to live with her grandmother in May with no supplies to prepare her for her first year of school.
“We didn’t have much, and we needed help on some things,” White said. “I called Project HELP, and they helped me when school started.”
The White family received school uniforms, paper, pencils, a mat and anything else on the school supplies list.
“Everything that she needed to start kindergarten, they gave it to me,” White said. “So, she had a book bag and she had everything the other kids had.”
White said she is grateful for what Project HELP did for her, and her granddaughter.
DONATIONS:
Vance said different organizations in the community stepped in and helped to buy supplies for Project HELP after the funding was lost. The United Way of North Central Mississippi provided some supplies, the Junior Auxiliary of Starkville provided coats during the winter and the Golden Triangle Knitting Guild knits and crochets gloves and hats for children to keep them warm.
More donations are still being sought to help the current students and any students that may be added.
“We have some of the school supplies purchased, already, so clothing and hygiene (items) are the most needed,” Vance said.
Clothing includes new or used clothes, socks and undergarments and hygiene items include anything from soap and deodorant to toothbrushes and toothpaste. Donations can be brought to the Emerson Family Resource Center.