DeMello students prepare clothing donation for needy kids

Nov 21, 2022

Fourth graders at DeMello School spent their recess period helping children in need on Friday, Nov. 18 as the class's student council prepared dozens of bags of children’s clothes for donation.

The clothes — which were donated by students’ families — will be taken to Gifts to Give in Acushnet where they will be distributed to South Coast families in need.

Fourth grade student council advisors Michaela Markey and Lynn Baker said they have been working with Gifts to Give for years and contacted the organization’s founder, Jim Stevens, earlier this year to ask what they could help with.

When Stevens told them that he was in need of children’s clothes, the teachers and their students got to work to make it happen.

“We’re really grateful to [the] DeMello parents,” Markey said. “It looks like we’ve got a lot of really good stuff.”

Once the donations were brought in, they needed to be sorted in order to weed out any items the organization wouldn’t accept, like torn and dirty items, or certain sorts of clothes, like used underwear.

Enter the fourth grade student council, who worked feverishly to get the job done before lunch time.

Though the classroom quickly descended into a whirlwind of activity, Markey said it was really an “organized chaos.”

“It’s like wrangling cats,” she said with a chuckle.

Everywhere in the room, students were unloading bags of clothes, checking each item one-by-one, and sorting them into trash or donation bags.

As the children worked, they talked about the good deed they were doing and how much it would be appreciated.

“This whole bag is jackets, which is so great,” said Sophia Costa.

“Gifts to Give is gonna be so happy because look at how many clothes we have,” said Ruby Mullane.

Baker said that she would be the one dropping off the donation after school, but that the class is planning a field trip to Gifts to Give later in the year to volunteer for the day.

“Jim puts the kids to work,” she said.