Proceeds from handmade pins to help children

A downtown Rock Hill gift shop has a special item on the shelves this month to support a local children’s advocacy organization.

Betsy Rock, owner of Overhead Station on Main Street, says she was inspired to craft handmade heart-shaped pins to sell for donations after reading a December newspaper column by York Comprehensive High School English teacher Kay McSpadden.

The column detailed the Christmas wish lists compiled by children who live in poverty. McSpadden wrote then: “Not one iPhone or iPad on the list. No Wiis or XBoxes or PlayStations.”

What the children asked for instead were bed sheets. Deodorant. Socks. Books. Toothpaste.

“It stirred my heart,” Rock said. Reading McSpadden’s words about the children’s most basic needs – children who were asking for toiletries and simple items instead of toys – was “wrenching,” Rock said.

The column was just a glimpse of what teachers see inside the classroom as they try to help children who live in poverty in York County.

McSpadden’s columns regularly appear in The Charlotte Observer and The Herald. A teacher for 38 years, McSpadden, 58, writes about public education funding, economic inequalities affecting families and children, and her experiences in the classroom.

She’s a South Carolina native and holds two degrees from Winthrop University. McSpadden is a National Board Certified English teacher, an award-winning writer and is working on a collection of short stories she hopes to publish. She’s also one of the area’s most visible advocates for children and proper funding for public schools in South Carolina.

Nearly two out of three children McSpadden teaches qualify for free or reduced lunch – an indicator of poverty affecting a majority of the students at York Comprehensive High School. Nationally, estimates put nearly half of all children in public schools needing free or reduced lunch.

Poverty, McSpadden said, has a clear adverse effect on a child’s success in school.

“Research shows us the importance of adequate prenatal monitoring, good nutrition, health care, access to books, safe neighborhoods, secure housing, adults with time and energy to devote to their children’s education – things children in poverty lack.”

McSpadden’s depiction of children living in such circumstances and struggling in school motivated Rock to find a way to help.

Rock is selling the pins at Overhead Station for a donation of $4. She’s already sold more than 50 and says she’s been positively overwhelmed that almost every customer has paid the $4 and then some.

Some people have given $20, even $50, as donations for Rock’s pins. The support, she said, is “heartwarming.”

This weekend, Rock will roll out her clay and make another batch of the decorative pins. She’s nearly sold out of the first batch in the East Main Street store she’s operated for 14 years. Before that, Rock’s store was located a few blocks away on Oakland Avenue for more than 20 years.

If her remaining stock sells fast, Rock said, she hopes customers will be patient because she only has time to do pottery on the weekends after operating her store during the week.

Money from the pin sales goes to the “Number One Question: Is it Good for the Children?” initiative in Rock Hill. The program is supported by the city’s Commission for Children and Youth. The campaign began in 2006 and its work has been recognized nationally by the America’s Promise Alliance and others.

Donations will be used to support local children. The campaign’s leaders have in the past supported literacy, healthy eating habits and youth wellness, and student dropout prevention.

Rock hopes to soon expand the donation effort by asking local potters to join her and contribute handmade bowls that will be sold. That money, she said, would be used for providing healthy meals to area children during the summer.

Many children living in poverty benefit from local summer feeding programs. During the school year, their lunch at school is sometimes the only nutritious meal those children receive. During months when school is not in session, it’s not guaranteed their families have money for regular meals.

When a child’s basic needs are not met and they live in poverty, they often experience developmental delays and emotional and behavioral difficulties, McSpadden said.

To those who say “poverty is no excuse for student failure,” McSpadden replies: “Poverty is an explanation for why some children struggle.”

Money isn’t all a child needs, she said, adding “but not having it puts so many roadblocks in a child’s life that it’s doubly unfair to then blame the child for failing to catch up.

“I think the most important thing we need to do to make a genuine difference in the lives of poor children is to make a commitment to the common good ... Everyone is a stakeholder in public schools because everyone benefits when all children are educated well.”

Rock said she’s supported charities and community service in the past through her Rock Hill church, but realizing through McSpadden’s writing the extent that local impoverished children are struggling just opened her eyes further.

“The more you look,” she said, “the more you see.”

This story was originally published March 6, 2015 at 9:44 PM with the headline "Proceeds from handmade pins to help children."