Ross Gives Supplies to Kids in Distress

The Ross Medical Education Center general office in St. Clair, MI completed a school supplies drive in September for Kids in Distress. They were able to deliver over 500 items to the local organization. The items included backpacks, pens, tape, spiral notebooks and pencils. Sheree Hale, who organized the office activity, said, “this was a great team effort as everyone helped with donations and finding the best back-to-school sales for us to stretch our money!”

Kids In Distress Services, Inc. (KIDS) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to help children and teens with necessary clothing and personal hygiene items when they are unexpectedly removed from their homes (i.e. entering foster care, entering a shelter, left homeless, home fires), as well as any other child/teen in need. They asked Ross to take on the school supplies as an added need this time of year.

The Ross St. Clair office has partnered with KIDS in the past through sponsoring a family over Christmas and doing a mitten/clothing tree. Through local support, KIDS is growing in the area. Additionally, in 2012, they were awarded a $15,500 grant by Community Foundation of St. Clair County in order to help their services to expand. Marie Fontana, the Ross office’s “community service coach,” said, “we are happy to help KIDS help kids, as this is close to the heart of everyone on our team. It’s easy to be motivated by a child who has a need.”

The director of KIDS, Jane Robinson, created the organization after receiving two foster children who had nothing but the clothes on their backs. There were no resources available for her to get clothes for them. Jane recognized a need and in 2002, she created Kids in Distress Services and ran it out of her garage. By 2003, she had outgrown her garage and moved to a storage facility. After realizing that the need was greater than she had anticipated, in 2004 the building was donated to the organization, and that is where they are still housed. Since 2004, KIDS has grown so much that they have had to find space to store their excess inventory. In April of 2011, KIDS was donated their own stand-alone building for the specific purpose of inventory storage.

You can learn more about KIDS and make your own donation at http://kidsindistressservices.org/