Collaboration drives the need for school uniforms

Nonprofit Ground Zero Elevated is collecting school uniform tops and bottoms to benefit Painesville City School District.

Nonprofit Ground Zero Elevated, Painesville, is collecting school uniform tops and bottoms to benefit Painesville City School District’s Raider Rack Clothing Assistance program.

“Children are coming back to in-school learning,” said Karyn Gant, Ground Zero Elevated founder and an employee at Elm Street Elementary School — the Raider Rack hub.

The Painesville native’s nonprofit endeavor formed five years ago at New Hope Baptist Church to help economically disadvantaged children.

In 2014, the program relocated to the Family Resource Center at the elementary school. At least 300 students are at Elm Street, Gant said.

Not only will uniform donations provide for those in need, but will unify everyone, she said.

“We’re not separated by anything. We’re a close-knit school, and we care about our children and our community,” Gant said. It sets the tone in the learning environment because nobody is looking at what somebody else has on.”

The district implemented the Academically Dressed program in all schools in 2007, according the school district. The Raider Rack clothing assistance program was also created the same year to allow families to recycle gently used and new clothing to help district families obtain clothes that comply with the school’s academic dress guidelines.

“I think it would’ve been easier for my parents to just go out and get all white shirts or all black pants, or all red shirts and all black pants,” Gant recalled, who attended Saint Clair Elementary School growing up, which did not have uniforms. “You don’t focus what other children have. We’re for one reason — to learn.”

For those interested in donating girl’s and boy’s tops and bottoms, they may call Gant at 440-521-4939 or Family Resource Center coordinator Maribel Young at 440-392-5548.

Tops can either be red, black, gray, white or blue, and bottoms can be either black or blue khakis. No jeans are permitted.

SUBMITTED Nonprofit Ground Zero Elevated’s Karyn Gant, of Painesville, and Maribel Young, Family Resource Center coordinator at Elm Street Elementary, are collecting school uniform tops and bottoms to benefit Painesville City Local School District’s Raider Rack Clothing Assistance program.