Published: November 04, 2009 01:38 pm      

'Coats for Kids' volunteers distribute coats at Headstart

Students at Headstart Academy got a surprise Friday when volunteers from Coats for Kids delivered approximately 69 new winter jackets to the school.

Coats for Kids is a ministry of Gainesville’s First Christian Church.

The project began several years ago.

“We delivered probably a little more than 100 coats that first year,” said long time Coats for Kids committee member Betty Morgan.

At first volunteers gave the coats to Gainesville ISD children.

They accepted donations of gently used coats and then used donated cash to purchase additional jackets at a store in the Dallas area.

In recent years, the volunteers have made some changes.

For instance, the coats they hand out now are all new.

The group also added a chili cook-off to help raise money for the coats.

This year, Take the Chill Out chili throwdown generated about 75 percent of its monetary goals, said committee member Lucy Haverkamp.

The shortfall came at a time when the need for jackets seems to be increasing.

“It (Coats for Kids) has steadily gotten bigger,” Morgan noted.

Volunteers also decided to increase the reach of the project to include students in all Cooke County schools.

Students who qualify for the coat program are identified through a forms distributed to local schools.

Parents decide whether or not to request assistance.

Morgan was one of the volunteers who got to see first hand how much a warm jacket means to many of the children.

The kids arrived in groups of five assisted by their teachers and Headstart director Dorris Walker.

Parent questionaires supplied information about each child’s jacket size.

Staff members selected a coat for each child and asked the students to try on the new winter wear before recording the student’s names inside the jackets.

Many of the children seemed overjoyed to get their new coats.

“The looks of the children’s faces is priceless,” Morgan said.