My New Red Shoes — imprint of joy
Redwood City nonprofit, five employees and volunteers, has helped ‘close the clothing gap’ for 55,000 of the poorest students, ages 5 to 18, since 2006
The shoes have a Velcro strap because, at age 5, Joy Gutierrez hasn’t yet mastered the art of tying them. But they are her pride and joy: a new pair of Nike sneakers.
“They make me feel like … a rock star!” Joy said during a recent evening at the transitional-housing Life-Moves shelter in San Mateo. She’s been living there since August with her mom and two siblings. It’s a temporary way-station in a pot-holed childhood, a place where the passing days are marked by Caltrain cars roaring down the tracks just a few feet from their small apartment. Yet despite the steady screams of metal-on-metal, Joy is just fine.
And the shoes and new
“Children will outgrow their shoes and clothes, but they’ll never outgrow that feeling that they’ve got a community that cares about them. They’ll remember that forever.”
— Minh Ngo, My New Red Shoes, executive director
tights and T-shirt she got from My New Red Shoes, a nonprofit group in nearby Redwood City, sure help.
“I felt happy with my new clothes,” Joy said as her older brother Carlos and sister Rosa looked on. “My friends at school like them, too.”
It doesn’t take much to lift a kid’s self-esteem, especially when the kid is living in poverty and on the streets or in a shelter like Joy, Rosa, 14, and Carlos, 17. When you’re feeling left out from other classmates lucky enough to wear nice clothes, it can seem like you’re forever walking a few feet behind everyone.
And that’s where My New Red Shoes comes in. The nonprofit is seeking $30,000 from Wish Book readers to help the fivemember
staff and its volunteers provide new shoes and clothes next fall to 500 homeless and impoverished kids in Santa Clara and San Mateo counties. It’s all about making big differences with just a decent pair of gym shorts or running shoes.
“They gave us a shopping spree, and I bought two pairs of shoes, two shirts, shorts and a duffle bag,” said Carlos, who just started his senior year at Westmoor High School in Daly City and is working part-time at McDonald’s to help his single mom get through these tough days.
“Especially in high school, the right clothes and shoes can make a real difference. Just getting a nice pair of shoes made me feel more like I belonged. Other kids have things I never had, and some kids can’t focus on class because they’re focused on what other people are wearing.”
Their mom, Patricia, was thrilled that her kids were selected to be part of the nonprofit’s Clothing for Confidence Program this fall. Since 2006, My New Red Shoes has helped “close the clothing gap” for more than 55,000 of the poorest students, ages five to 18, mostly in the Bay Area but also through its Portland branch. With a $1.8-million annual budget that has grown each year, Red Shoes gets its funding from a combination of philanthropic groups, foundations, corporations and individual donors.
Executive Director Minh Ngo said that each child selected by one of the group’s Bay Area social-services partners receives anywhere from $75 to $150 worth of shoes and clothing for the coming school year, either a pair of shoes wrapped like a birthday present or a gift card they can use to buy clothes at Old Navy.
“Children will outgrow their shoes and clothes, but they’ll never outgrow that feeling that they’ve got a community that cares about them,” Ngo said. “They’ll remember that forever.”
Ngo said that the organization was started by Menlo Park entrepreneur Heather Hopkins, who was inspired by stories her own mother used to tell her.
“When Heather was pregnant with her child, her mom opened up to her about her experiences with childhood poverty,” Ngo said. “She talked about not having proper clothes for school and how that affected her self esteem. She told Heather that ‘If somebody had just given me a new pair of shoes or a new dress, I would have remembered that for the rest of my life.’ That’s how it all got started.”
And My New Red Shoes? “Our name was born from that,” Ngo said. “On her first day of kindergarten, Heather’s mom bought her a new pair of shoes that she had never gotten for herself as a little girl. They were red, and we have a photo in our office of Heather and those shoes.”
Ngo said that the recipients, such as the Gutierrez family, are a perfect example of the power of a pair of shoes to change a life.
“This family has been through so much,” she said. “They’re homeless, Rosa has a learning disability and Carlos is in high school but also working to support his entire family. He’s now the man of the house at 17.”
In other words, the family is just the kind of people My New Red Shoes was created for.
”You see a family like that and for us this is a chance to honor them and provide support that’s really meaningful,” Ngo said. “They know people are rallying around them.”
Patricia Gutierrez said My New Red Shoes has left a permanent imprint on her family’s heart and soul.
“It was cool to see the other families getting their stuff. Everyone seemed so happy,” she said of the shopping spree. “There’s a lot of families that don’t ever get a chance like that in life. We came to this shelter with nothing and I can’t buy new clothes for my kids because they’re too expensive. So for us, this has been like a dream.”
Contact Patrick May at 408-920-5689.