Fund will offer help in crises

School district to reach out to families in need

Tragic, unexpected situations arise in the lives of Charleston County children.

They die in shootings, car wrecks and drownings, and they lose their homes in fires.

Until now, the way the school district reached out to help those children's families varied. Sometimes, schools' faculty members took up a collection. Other times, district counselors contacted local nonprofit organizations to see what they could offer.

"There are times when we don't have a good way to support some real needy children and their families," said Mike Bobby, the district's chief financial officer. "There's no place to pull money."

The district can't use taxpayers' money to help, but its leadership saw a need to create a fund that could serve that purpose.

The district has established the Superintendent's Children in Crisis Fund to give schools a means to support children and families in critical situations that could not otherwise be resolved.

The superintendent, chief financial officer and a school board member will oversee the fund to review requests and grant expenditures. School board members seemed to support this idea, and some expressed a desire to ensure its longevity.

The fund's purpose isn't to support day-to-day needs of families; it's for unique, catastrophic or emergency situations, Bobby said.

Schools Superintendent Nancy McGinley emphasized that the district's goal was not to take on the role of a social services agency, and the fund would go toward smaller purchases, such as sending flowers to the family of a deceased student or buying clothes for a child who lost everything in a house fire.

Schools want to show they care in extreme situations, and employees — from food service workers to principals — often dig into their pockets to help, she said. She cited the example of a Wando High student last year who moved north with family only to discover they had no job or place to live during the cold winter months. The school's faculty took up a collection for bus fare so they could come home. This new fund would give schools a place to turn to in this type of situation, she said.

"We have to be good human beings and take care of people in dire need," McGinley said. "When tragedy strikes, we'd like to offer some help. There's always a need to reach out and help people in need."

Deposits from the fund will come from various sources. The superintendent sometimes receives donations from community members, and the district receives rebates from vendors based on its volume purchasing. Both would go into the crisis fund, which has at least $13,000 now. None of it has been spent yet.

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