BATESVILLE — At Cord-Charlotte Elementary School, every student has the chance to go shopping.
In between lunch and recess, each student at the Charlotte school, located at 225 School Road, about 15 minutes east of Batesville, is encouraged to enter The Store, where shelves are stuffed with nonperishable food items and hygiene products and racks are filled with backpacks and clothing for kindergarten through sixth-graders. All items are free to the students.
“If they kids are hungry or tired or cold, they’re not going to learn anything that day,” said Susi Epperson, principal.
The 150-student school cleared out a classroom that had been used as storage space in the gymnasium to establish The Store this year, after a partnership with Rice Depot ended in 2015.
“Rice Depot sent us a letter saying they weren’t going to fund us anymore,” Epperson said. “[They said], ‘We’re just not funding schools outside of the Little Rock area.’ We were kind of in a pickle. We didn’t know what we were going to do.”
Before The Store was created, a local church held an ongoing food drive to help the school. Epperson said it was important for the storage-area-turned-pantry to feel like a store so that kids will not be offended to shop for items that they need. They are even given bags when they enter the store so that they feel like shoppers.
People may not understand the need for food and clothing in Charlotte, an isolated town, unless they visit it, Epperson said. This school year, the school had double the amount of students turn in a form that said they were in need of a food bag to take home, and bus drivers had informed Epperson that some students could be seen at the bus stop without a winter coat.
“It takes a village because the bus drivers and the lunch ladies are one of our best resources,” she said of learning how many students are in need.
Seeking help, Epperson penned a Facebook status Nov. 23 asking for socks, shoes, jeans, sweats, coats, mittens and toboggans to be donated. The status reads, in part: “Dear Santa, I’m about to ask for a miracle, so get out your magic wand and wake up a few extra elves. I’ve truly got the best kids at my school. Not all of them have everything they need though.”
Epperson said after she posted her wish for donations on Facebook, the response was overwhelming and she saw the most donations the school has ever received.
“It’s just been a blessing because people that I know and people that I don’t know have been dropping by the school and bringing all kinds of stuff,” she said.
At the beginning of the school year, every student takes home a form that asks if he or she is in need of food backpack, which goes home with the student every two weeks. The form does not ask about income, and the school aims to pack more items for students who have siblings at home.
Even if a student does not receive a food backpack, he or she is encouraged to visit The Store around recess time.
“If I were to get two to three kids out of class that really need [the items], it embarrasses them,” Epperson said.
Epperson said the clothes closet started as a few trash bags filled with items, but the school did away with that because Epperson did not want children to look through trash bags for clothes. Naming the space “The Store” also helped create a welcoming environment, she said. Epperson said some teachers even use a trip to The Store as a reward.
“When we started calling it ‘Clothes Closet,’ it kind of sounded like a yard sale or something, and that’s kind of what it was like,” she said. “We wash all the clothes that are donated, and we make sure we don’t hang up anything we wouldn’t put on our own kids.”
April Massey, whose 10-year-old son, Keith Ward, attends the school, helped raise $301 for The Store. She spent a week collecting money in secret and surprised Epperson with the money.
“We knew she was stressed over having to worry about the kids and coming up with different items, so we thought it’d be a good idea to try to help,” Massey said.
Massey said The Store is for every child.
“It’s not just for low-income,” she said. “It’s for anybody. If you rip your jeans at school and you need something so your parents don’t have to leave work to bring you clothes, it’s really good to have that.”
Since Epperson’s Facebook post to Santa, the school has received at least $1,000 in cash and check donations. She said there’s no way she could count the number of times a truckload of clothes has stopped by.
“I see on Facebook and in the paper, these churches around here are gathering things and sending them off,” Epperson said. “Every day, I have kids who come in that need things. Don’t send it around. I need it right here in Independence County.”
Epperson said the school is still in need of jeans, pants, shoes and canned goods.
“To me, I think every school should have something like that,” she said.
Staff writer Syd Hayman can be reached at (501) 244-4307 or shayman@arkansasonline.com.