Nancy McCluskey-Moore
Due to COVID restrictions, students from Catalina to Miami couldn’t come to Kids’ Closet in Mammoth to select their new spring wardrobes. Thanks to the hard work of Kids’ Closet volunteers, along with the cooperation of parents, teachers, and school administrators, the clothing was delivered to the kids!
Counselors provided teachers with the names of students who qualified, based on economic need, to receive clothing from Kids’ Closet. Requests for clothing and shoe sizes were sent to parents. The information received by the teachers was then submitted to Kids’ Closet volunteers. There of course were some challenges, with inaccuracies in student lists such as misspelled names, incorrect gender, or wrong grade level. Fortunately, most of these errors were spotted by volunteers and corrected before bags of clothing were sent to the schools.
Volunteers, wearing masks and maintaining social distance, selected the clothing and shoes for each child, scanned the barcodes of the items chosen (for inventory control), and packed each child’s wardrobe into large plastic bags labeled with the child’s name, grade, and school. Each child also was given two grade-appropriate books and toiletries. While the process was labor intensive, Kids’ Closet was able to provide 580 students with new wardrobes for the spring season. Although this is far less than the over 1,300 students normally served in the spring, at least these children had their clothing needs met.
Inventory at the Kids’ Closet was conducted on April 7, and hopes are high for returning to normal operations in the fall.