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Helping hands reaching out to Ike victims
By KIMBERLY POORE
Communities have come together as a result of Hurricane Ike, but generosity has even trickled down to pre-school.
Shortly after Hurricane Ike, Thee Heritage Christian School school director, Nancy Rushing, sent a note to parents asking for ideas on how to help victims of the storm.
“I had the idea to adopt a preschool,” said Dawn Han, Thee Heritage Christian School parent. “With Nancy’s blessing, I found a preschool very similar to Thee Heritage Christian School and volunteered to lead the effort.”
THCS chose East End Preschool & Kindergarten which is affiliated with First Presbyterian Church in Galveston and has been serving the community over 20 years. The church was built in 1870 and had never taken on water; during Ike it had 34 inches. “The school took on three feet of water and lost their entire office, art supply closet, toy closet, and everything in four classrooms,” Han said. “The entire Children’s Library for the church and school was gone. East End Preschool had 88 students ranging from infants to kindergartners. Every family in the school, but one, had water in their homes.”
The project had two objectives to meet the immediate need of clothes and shoes for the children of EEP, and help the school reopen by supplying toys, books, and games for the classrooms.
“We collected clothes and shoes from our families through October, and in early November delivered over 465 pounds of clothing plus shoes to 30 children in 24 families,” Han said.
Rather than send boxes of clothes labeled by size and letting families go through the boxes, THCS made a box for each family.
“Our goal was for each box to have short and long sleeve shirts, shorts, pants, pajamas and a ‘proud to wear to church’ outfit for each child in the family,” Han said. “Since some families sent toys and books early, we tried to include a toy and book for each child as well.”
One EEP parent in Galveston volunteered her home, despite losing everything on her first floor, to be a distribution point to get the clothes to other EEP families.
Little Lambs Preschool in Fairfield heard about what THCS was and offered to help by also collecting books for East End Preschool. They collected over 15 boxes of books to contribute.
In December THCS started collecting toys, games, and books for the classrooms. Just before Christmas they had a parent workday to sort, organize and box all the donations. “THCS is currently holding more than 60 boxes of books, toys, games and classroom supplies to deliver to the school when the school is ready to reopen,” Han said.
East End Preschool hopes to reopen by the end of January 2009.
Thee Heritage Christian School is located at 7934 State Highway 6 North and is part of Heritage Presbyterian Church.
Shortly after Hurricane Ike, Thee Heritage Christian School school director, Nancy Rushing, sent a note to parents asking for ideas on how to help victims of the storm.
“I had the idea to adopt a preschool,” said Dawn Han, Thee Heritage Christian School parent. “With Nancy’s blessing, I found a preschool very similar to Thee Heritage Christian School and volunteered to lead the effort.”
THCS chose East End Preschool & Kindergarten which is affiliated with First Presbyterian Church in Galveston and has been serving the community over 20 years. The church was built in 1870 and had never taken on water; during Ike it had 34 inches. “The school took on three feet of water and lost their entire office, art supply closet, toy closet, and everything in four classrooms,” Han said. “The entire Children’s Library for the church and school was gone. East End Preschool had 88 students ranging from infants to kindergartners. Every family in the school, but one, had water in their homes.”
The project had two objectives to meet the immediate need of clothes and shoes for the children of EEP, and help the school reopen by supplying toys, books, and games for the classrooms.
“We collected clothes and shoes from our families through October, and in early November delivered over 465 pounds of clothing plus shoes to 30 children in 24 families,” Han said.
Rather than send boxes of clothes labeled by size and letting families go through the boxes, THCS made a box for each family.
“Our goal was for each box to have short and long sleeve shirts, shorts, pants, pajamas and a ‘proud to wear to church’ outfit for each child in the family,” Han said. “Since some families sent toys and books early, we tried to include a toy and book for each child as well.”
One EEP parent in Galveston volunteered her home, despite losing everything on her first floor, to be a distribution point to get the clothes to other EEP families.
Little Lambs Preschool in Fairfield heard about what THCS was and offered to help by also collecting books for East End Preschool. They collected over 15 boxes of books to contribute.
In December THCS started collecting toys, games, and books for the classrooms. Just before Christmas they had a parent workday to sort, organize and box all the donations. “THCS is currently holding more than 60 boxes of books, toys, games and classroom supplies to deliver to the school when the school is ready to reopen,” Han said.
East End Preschool hopes to reopen by the end of January 2009.
Thee Heritage Christian School is located at 7934 State Highway 6 North and is part of Heritage Presbyterian Church.
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