RUSSELLVILLE — Skye Thompson, human-services worker for the Russellville School District, said she has been “blown away” by what Arkansas Tech University students accomplished in a hygiene-item drive.
Students in the Because We Can organization donated items in April valued at $7,000, including travel-size body wash from Unilever in Northwest Arkansas; then the district received another donation of 44,000 body washes from the company in May.
“I’m speechless, actually,” Thompson said.
“I have students pre-K through 12th grade that have various needs throughout the school year — that are homeless, that are hungry, that don’t have your basics, like toilet paper and toothbrushes. I have a hard time purchasing those because I don’t have the funding,” she said. “I have to reach out to my community. We’re very blessed because we have a lot of teachers who step up and pay for those things out of their own pockets.”
Thompson said she was put in touch with the Because We Can group through one of her co-workers, Kayla Warnick, whose husband, Jason Warnick, is an Arkansas Tech faculty member in the behavioral-sciences department. Because We Can co-advisers James Stobaugh and Sean Huss also teach in that department.
Thompson said she was invited by Stobaugh and Huss to talk to Because We Can members about her program and its needs.
“We talked about doing a massive hygiene drive on campus,” Thompson said.
Senior Kendall Tubb of Little Rock, one of the co-founders of Because We Can, said Thompson told the group that some Russellville School District students are being sent home or sent out of class and “being made fun of” by others because of the students’ hygiene problems.
“We said. ‘Yeah, that’s pretty bad; we can help with that,’” Tubb said. “It was really, really awesome; we were super excited about the huge turnout.”
Stobaugh said a “friendly competition” was held on campus for the hygiene drive in April, and a trophy was presented to the winner, Church of Christ Student Center. Huss said points were awarded for donated items, and more points were given for products Thompson needed the most, such as feminine-hygiene products, toothpaste, underwear and socks.
Thompson emphasized that in the first drive, Because We Can students themselves purchased some of the 5,000 items they donated. Local dentists and hotels also donated items, she said.
She was given hairbrushes, dental floss, toothpaste, toilet paper, diapers, shampoo, conditioner, paper towels and laundry detergent, as well as some the body wash. A recent Arkansas Tech graduate involved in the drive has an aunt who works at Unilever, Huss said.
Thompson said she was thrilled with the donation; then the even bigger Unilever donation came in. The total retail value of items in both donations is $72,560, Stobaugh said.
Because We Can members, including Danielle Hurst of Conway and Logan Felder and Sydney Skaggs, both of Russellville, as well as faculty members Huss, Stobaugh and Warnick, unloaded the 900 boxes of travel-size body wash that arrived on the Unilever truck on May 28.
Felder, a junior biology major, said he jumped at the chance to help with the project because he has been too busy with schoolwork to participate much lately.
“It was actually really fun,” he said. “I didn’t get to do much with them through the semester, so when that opportunity came up to assist them — they were asking for trucks and just extra sets of arms to move it all, I participated. It was kind of exciting see that much product from one particular source specifically for this area’s schools and the surrounding areas.”
Thompson said she doesn’t have a warehouse in which to store items in bulk, so she took as many as she could, between 4,000 and 5,000. The remainder was donated by the Because We Can organization to other outreach organizations in Russellville, Stobaugh said.
The donations will help Thompson accomplish a goal she set in fall 2015 — to provide students with a variety of items throughout the school year.
“I have an office full of huge bins, and I have [the donations] all separated. I’m relying on my building personnel, whether it be nurses, counselors, anybody in the buildings — if they have a student they feel is in need, I will make up a hygiene bag. I’ve never had the ability to do that, never had the items to do that,” she said.
She said 36 students in the 5,300-enrollment Russellville School District were living
in hotels or shelters in fall 2015.
Thompson, who is also the homeless coordinator for the district, said 130 students are identified as homeless. Students considered homeless, per the federal grant that funds her position, include students who “double up” and live with other families or live in substandard housing.
Thompson said Because We Can is going to make the hygiene drive a yearly project for the Russellville School District.
“Again, I’ve been taken aback by the generosity of not only those students, but those professors who took it upon themselves to reach out to me because they see a need; it’s just unbelievable,” she said.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.