Current News
MPD Electric Cooperative Gifts $2,000 to Help4Kids (scnow)
Child Hunger Awareness Week begins with Help 4 Kids Vienna sausage drive (scnow.com)
Duke Energy Foundation surprises two Florence organizations with $5,000 grants (scnow.com)
Florence Wine and Food festival donated $70,000 from 2019 spring event.
SCHOOL YEAR 2018 – 2019
Help 4 Kids Florence completed its sixth school year of operation by providing bags of food each weekend of the academic year among 34 schools (including seven Head Start programs) in all five Florence County school districts (Florence, Pamplico, Lake City, Timmonsville and Johnsonville). During the summer, Help 4 Kids Florence supports the year-round program at Timrod Elementary School as well as various programs throughout Florence County school districts.
See the 2019 survey results below. Thanks to all our generous donors who are making such a difference in combatting childhood hunger!
Help 4 Kids Florence wants to give a big shout out to our partners at Pepsi. This group donated food and came to pack bags. Help 4 Kids couldn’t operate with out the generous folks at Pepsi. Each week they pick up the food we order from IGA and Aldi and bring it to the Warehouse free of charge!! They are an awesome company looking for ways to help our community.
In February 2018, Help 4 Kids Florence was awarded the Marion Medallion, an award sponsored by Francis Marion University and The Morning News in recognition of exemplary volunteer service in Florence County. Click on the link to read more about this prestigious award.
Help 4 Kids Florence, Billy Powers receive Marion Medallion awards
Help 4 Kids Florence benefits from Glasspro’s 3 Degree Guarantee program
The 3 Degree Guarantee Program is a partnership between Glasspro and WBTW Channel 13, where every day that meteorologist Frank Johnson predicts the day’s high temperature within 3 degrees, Glasspro donates $100 to a selected charity in the Lowcounty or Grand Strand/Pee Dee region. Help 4 Kids Florence was selected as the charity in February 2018 and thanks to Glasspro’s generosity and Frank Johnson’s accurate predictions, hungry elementary school children in Florence County will benefit from the $1,700 donation by Glasspro.
The check was presented at WBTW. Pictured are L to R: Glasspro President, Paul Heinauer; Diane Welsh, Clark Reifsnider and Frank Johnson.
Thank you, Florence County!
Help 4 Kids Florence, in partnership with The Morning News, conducted a “Rally Week” from 14-21 January 2018 to benefit hungry elementary school children in Florence County. More than $7,300 in cash and more than 11,300 cans of Vienna Sausages were donated by generous people throughout the county.
This magnificent outpouring of generosity from citizens in our county will be of invaluable assistance to Help 4 Kids Florence in sustaining its current level of weekly support of providing meals for the weekend to approximately 2,200 hungry elementary school children among thirty-three schools in all five Florence County school districts. Click on the following Rally Week articles from the Morning News to learn more about childhood hunger and the efforts of Help 4 Kids Florence – and many others – to combat this huge issue.
Hunger hits home: Help 4 Kids gearing up for collection
Help 4 Kids food drive to be held Saturday in Florence
Help 4 Kids collects Vienna sausages for hunger awareness week
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: Bags make a difference
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: Food bag likened to Christmas presents
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: Need is strong for bags of food for Pee Dee children
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: ‘Friday Bags’ let students know ‘that someone cares’
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: Significant number of students face hunger in Pee Dee
Childhood Hunger Rally Week: Bags of food help students learn
Can do: Help 4 Kids’ Childhood Hunger Rally Week concludes, energizes volunteers
Feeding Florence’s hungry children: Help 4 Kids Florence provides food for students
Help 4 Kids Florence Recognized by South Carolina Secretary of State
On Wednesday, 15 November, Help 4 Kids Florence received the 2017 Angel award from South Carolina Secretary of State, Mark Hammond. Each year the Secretary of State recognizes 10 charities in South Carolina that have devoted at least 80% or more of their total expenditures to charitable programs. Last year Help 4 Kids gave 97.4% to feed hungry elementary school children in Florence County.
Pictured with the Secretary of State are (L to R): Diane Welsh, President; Allie Walker, Vice President & Treasurer; and Debbie Watson, Director at Large.
SCHOOL YEAR 2017 – 2018
Help 4 Kids Florence completed its fifth school year of operation by providing bags of food each weekend of the academic year among 34 schools (including seven Head Start programs) in all five Florence County school districts (Florence, Pamplico, Lake City, Timmonsville and Johnsonville). During the summer, Help 4 Kids Florence supports the year-round program at Timrod Elementary School as well as various programs throughout Florence County school districts.
See the 2018 survey results below. Thanks to all our generous donors who are making such a difference in combatting childhood hunger!
Thank you to Home Goods for their generous donation to Help 4 Kids Florence during the grand opening celebration. We are thankful for their economic investment in Florence and their investment in the children in our community.
The weekend of April 13th and 14th the first annual Wine and Food Festival was held in downtown Florence. Help 4 Kids Florence was the local non-profit charity for the event. On Monday, May 21st Help 4 Kids Florence was presented with a check for 23,883.84. Tim Norwood and Frank Chisholm, Event Sponsors and Helen Holland, Event Director present Diane Welsh, President of Help 4 Kids, Florence with a check for $23,883.84.Board members Derman Hodge, Annie Sarwee, and Debbie Watson join in the presentation.
McLaurin Elementary School collected 4846 cans of Vienna sausages during a food drive held between May 7th and May 11th for Help 4 Kids Florence! Wow, What a project!!!
This venture was coordinated by The McLaurin P.E.A.R.L.S. and their sponsor Ms. Deidre Harley, Technology Teacher. The drive was done in loving memory of 2 McLaurin ladies, Laura Mims and Rosa King. McLaurin also presented Help 4 Kids Florence with a check for $500.00 on Friday, May 4th during their annual Walk Around North America. Elders, Parker Winterten and Patrick Small help unload the 4,458 cans of Vienna sausage from McLaurin food drive.
Timrod Elementary School’s Beta Club organized a school-wide Ramen Noodle food drive for Help for Kids during April. They collected 2589 packages of ramen noodles. That’s enough to put in 200 bags of food for hungry children. The Beta Club is under the leadership of the Guidance Counselor, Ms. Taneisha Muldrow. The Principal of Timrod is Mrs. Michelle McBride.
Thank you to our for your great support of Help 4 Kids, Florence!!
St. Anthony’s School packed 1 complete pallet on April 19th! They were a great group!! Thank you St. Anthony’s !!
St. Paul’s Youth group packed 1 pallet and prepped many bins for our deliveries this week. They were a great group!! Thank you St. Pauls’s !
Thanks to BB&T for spending volunteer hours at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse as part of their “Lighthouse Volunteer Program.” They packed 540 bags, which will go home with hungry elementary school students to help sustain them over the weekend.
Food Lion Helps in a Big Way!
Food Lion provided the food, and their associates packed 2,435 bags to provide an extra bag of food for spring break for Florence County elementary students who receive support from Help 4 Kids Florence.
Thank you Food Lion!
The King’s Academy Gives Back
On March 14th, a group of 7th and 8th graders from The King’s Academy packed more than 500 bags at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse, and additionally, they prepped bins for the packing team the next day! This was a part of their giving back and mission work during the week-long event. A big thank you for all of their hard work!
Thanks to Monster Worldwide, Inc. for their continuing and faithful support. Recently, a group of their employees brought food to the warehouse; inventoried donated food, and packed 270 bags. What a great group!
The talented anglers from South Florence High School and Southside Middle School recently put down their rods and reels and spent time packing bags at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse. They did a great job!
Help 4 kids Florence thanks Hannah Kate White for collecting food at her Birthday Party. Hannah is a great example of never being too young to start making a difference in the community!
Thanks to students from St. Anthony School for volunteering to pack bags. What a caring and enthusiastic group!
Girl Scout Troop 194/195 recently volunteered at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse and packed bags – more than 400 of them! The community service performed by these young ladies is admirable, and they are setting a great example for their contemporaries.
Pee Dee Federal Credit Union recently presented a check to Help 4 Kids Florence to help feed hungry elementary school children in Florence county. We appreciate their continuing support in fighting childhood hunger in Florence County!
Recently, Help 4 Kids Florence received a generous donation from Darlington Raceway on behalf of Wilson High School IB student Rachna Rawalpally. As a service project, Miss Rawalpally coordinated a “Trunk-or-Treat” event at Darlington Raceway in October and afterwards, she was asked to select a charity to which the Raceway could donate. Miss Rawalpally chose Help 4 Kids Florence as her charity, and lots of hungry children will benefit from her thoughtfulness!
Pictured L to R: Mr. Kelly Tharp, Darlington Raceway President; Ms. Debbie Watson, Help 4 Kids Florence Schools Coordinator; Miss Rawalpally; Ms. Kelly Clouse, Wilson High School IB teacher; Ms. Josie Stratton, Wilson High School IB Coordinator.
Employees of Patheon, part of Thermo Fisher Scientific, recently spent time at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse storing donated food, packing bags, breaking down cardboard packing material for eventual recycling and replenishing supplies on the packing tables. What a fun and dedicated group that displayed a commendable sense of community spirit! Hungry elementary children in Florence County will be the benefactors of their good work.
Help 4 Kids wants to recognize The Florence Kiwanis club for their ongoing interest and support. Recently they planned one of their weekly meetings to come out to the warehouse and pack bags.
Allie Walker, Vice President and Treasurer of Help 4 Kids Florence, recently presented to the Pee Dee Picklers a certificate of appreciation for their help with a food drive. The food and money collected gave Help 4 Kids Florence the ability to distribute 1568 bags of food to hungry elementary children in Florence County.
Team Takedown, an 8th grade boys’ travel basketball team, donated their time on MLK Day to help pack bags. These boys are winners, and we wish them success during the season!
The FMU Psychology Graduate Student Association recently spent time at Help 4 Kids packing bags and inventorying food donations. They did an awesome job, and lots of hungry children will be the benefactors of their volunteer work with Help 4 Kids Florence.
Thanks to representatives from GE Medical for recently taking the time to prepare food bags. More than 2,100 bags of food for the weekend are distributed to “food insecure” elementary students in Florence County each week, and this could not be accomplished without the support of hundreds of people in the county who recognize that childhood hunger is a problem that must be dealt with.
Andrew Orr recently celebrated his 7th Birthday. Rather than presents, he asked friends to bring food to donate to Help 4 Kids Florence. He collected 519 items, and there will be many hungry children who will be fed because of the generosity of Andrew!
Many thanks to Pack 473 from Pisgah United Methodist Church. They collected enough food to help feed 125 hungry elementary children in Florence County, and they also spent an evening packing bags. These hard-working scouts packed 476 bags in one hour. Way to Go!!
Many thanks to the energetic ladies of the Junior League of Florence. They packed 800 bags of food to be distributed to hungry elementary school children in Florence County.
Many thanks to Alexis Taylor, Chrystal Johnson and Lindsay Odom of AAF of Florence and all the employees at GE Healthcare for the awesome fundraiser and food drive for Help 4 Kids Florence. Through their generosity, over 606 bags of food for the weekend will be provided to hungry elementary children in Florence County.
The generous donations collected by Raines Hospitality during their food drive and fundraiser in August gave Help 4 Kids Florence the ability to provide 402 hungry children with a meal for the weekend. Thank you!
Help 4 Kids Florence would like to thank all the employees at Blue Cross Blue Shield/PGBA for their tremendous food drive during the month of July. The employees contributed enough food to feed 1,285 hungry children. This is the third year that Blue Cross Blue Shield / PGBA has had a food drive to benefit hungry children in Florence County.
The youth group from Southside Baptist Church recently volunteered at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse, where they counted and sorted 1,916 cans of donated food. They did an awesome job!
Help 4 Kids Florence relies on dedicated volunteers of all ages, and the Southside Baptist youth have demonstrated their commitment to helping children who are less fortunate than they.
The Magnet Champions Nursing of McLeod Regional Medical Center recently had a very successful food drive for Help 4 Kids. They were able to collect enough food to provide 850 bags to distribute to hungry children in Florence County. They not only delivered all the food to the warehouse, but they stayed to help inventory the food.
The congregation of “The Well”, a contemporary service at Central United Methodist Church, took time on Sunday, June 25th to reach out into the community and offer a helping hand. The children and adults pictured packed more than 500 bags for hungry children in our community.
A hearty thanks to Brad White and the youth of Southside Baptist Church for their help. Recently, they spent a morning at the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse packing bags and inventorying food. What an awesome group!
Cate Urquhart recently celebrated her birthday and requested food for Help 4 Kids in lieu of presents. Thanks to Cate, the food and money donated at her birthday celebration will provide a bag of food for the weekend to 170 hungry children. What a wonderful example Cate is setting for her contemporaries!
Thanks to St. Paul UMC for collecting food for Help 4 Kids during their recent Vacation Bible School. As a result of their generosity, 176 bags of food for the weekend will be distributed.
Help 4 Kids Florence Received a Generous Grant from Leadership Florence
The 2017 class of Leadership Florence conducted an amazingly successful fundraiser, a Disco Gala, in mid-May, and the profits from that fundraiser were distributed to three local non-profit organizations. During the 31 May graduation of the class, Help 4 Kids Florence was honored to receive a grant in the amount of $10,311.87.
Thank you, Leadership Florence, for your service to our community and for supporting – in such a big way – efforts to combat childhood hunger!
(Pictured are Help 4 Kids Florence board members Debbie Watson and Clark Reifsnider. On the right are Leadership Florence members (L to R): Jensen Seear, Lauren Bunten, Katie Waring and Dr. Daphne Carter-McCants).
Help 4 Kids Florence Recognizes Volunteers
The Board of Directors of Help 4 Kids Florence hosted a cookout during the evening of 23 May to thank the faithful volunteers who spent countless hours during the 2016-2017 school year manning food drives, sorting and inventorying food, packing individual bags of food for the weekend and delivering those bags (approximately 65,000!) to the schools.
More than 100 people generously donate their time to support Help 4 Kids Florence to ensure hungry children receive a meal.
Thank you, volunteers, for acknowledging that childhood hunger is a problem and for being willing to do something about it!
Dalton Prosser’s Eagle Scout Project Supports Help 4 Kids Florence
Dalton Prosser, a member of Boy Scout Troop 402 at Highland Park United Methodist Church, recently set himself apart from more than 90% of his contemporaries by completing his Eagle Scout project.
As his project, Dalton recruited 36 volunteers to man the May food drives at the Beltline and S. Irby St. Wal-Mart stores. Dalton and his volunteers collected monetary and food donations, transported all donations to the Help 4 Kids Florence warehouse and then sorted and inventoried all the donations. As a result of Dalton’s leadership and the efforts of his volunteers, 1,098 individual bags of food for the weekend will be packed and distributed to hungry children.
Thank you, Dalton, and Well Done!
Representatives from St. Luke Lutheran Church, Highland Park United Methodist Church and Coastal Healthcare Resources recently donated their time to pack the individual bags of food which are distributed each week. Among the three organizations, nearly 3,000 bags were packed! Thanks to all for generously giving their time to assist in combatting childhood hunger!
SCHOOL YEAR 2016 – 2017
Help 4 Kids Florence completed its fourth school year of operation by providing more than 1,900 bags of food each weekend of the academic year among 34 schools (including seven Head Start programs) in all five Florence County school districts (Florence, Pamplico, Lake City, Timmonsville and Johnsonville). During the summer, Help 4 Kids Florence supports the year-round program at Timrod Elementary School as well as various programs throughout Florence County school districts.
See the 2017 survey results below. Thanks to all our generous donors who are making such a difference in combatting childhood hunger!
Pack 473 from Pisgah UMC recently donated food to Help 4 Kids Florence, and additionally, 810 bags of food for the weekend were packed. What valuable lessons these boys are learning about community service!
Pee Dee Federal Credit Union recently conducted a fundraiser for Help 4 Kids Florence. At their request, the money donated was used to purchase cans of Vienna Sausages – 1,772 cans!
Help 4 Kids President Diane Welsh and Vice President Allie Walker recently participated in a chapel program with students at All Saints’ Day School. Part of the program consisted of a puppet show which was written by Diane and which was used as a means of discussing childhood hunger.
HUNGER AWARENESS WEEK – THE NEED TO COMBAT CHILDHOOD HUNGER
The Florence Morning News, in partnership with Help 4 Kids Florence, ran a series of articles during the week of 22 January 2017 to highlight to the public the seriousness of childhood hunger.
Read the week-long series of articles here: http://www.scnow.com/news/collection_b88839dc-e1b1-11e6-8cc8-57cdd65ad25e.html