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Newport, N.H., Head Start Children Near Goal of Buying Wheelchair for Child

Posted on: Friday, 7 April 2006, 15:01 CDT

By Rebecca Miller, Eagle Times, Claremont, N.H.

Apr. 5--NEWPORT -- With the clink of coins in a change jar, the children of Newport Head Start have helped a child they had never met get closer to buying a wheelchair.

Over the past two weeks, the Head Start kids raised almost $200 to go toward purchasing a wheelchair for 12-year-old Canaan, N.H., resident Alyssa Quimby, who has been wheelchair-bound since she was born with cerebral palsy.

The fund-raiser began after Lori Menard, the program's family advocate, said she learned that Alyssa, a family friend, could not afford a new chair. She approached Head Start, which is under the direction of Southwest Community Services, about putting a jar out for donations and for two weeks the children marched in with baggies of change.

Although the oldest kids are only 5, they pitched in wholeheartedly, Menard said. Some children even asked to use some of their birthday money to put in the jar. On Friday, when they wrapped up their fund-raiser, Menard said the children had collected $171.04.

Alyssa's mother, Ann Corrette, said her daughter needs a new manual wheelchair but Medicaid insurance will not pay for another one because regulations allow for one chair every five years. Alyssa got a powered chair for school two years ago.

"Out of our own pocket, we're going to have to buy her a new chair," she said.

Alyssa's manual chair, which the family uses at home and for transporting, was used when they got it, Corrette said. Alyssa is outgrowing it, and the wheel has fallen off at least once before. The cost, Corrette estimated, could be $600 for a new chair.

"You just don't realize how much it adds up to until you have the bill in front of you," she said.

She is grateful that Newport Head Start organized the fund-raiser.

"I just could not believe that these people that had never even met my daughter at all ... it was just amazing that they did this," she said. "It's just overwhelming, completely overwhelming for me." Newport's fund-raising idea has spread to other programs, including the Jaffrey (N.H.) Head Start. After a meeting with representatives from other Southwest Community Services Head Start programs, Newport's fund-raiser appealed to a parent from the Jaffrey location. A change jar has now been set out until May 17, family advocate and center coordinator Jan Wilkins said Tuesday.

"It's a community thing," she said.

Although some might not completely understand the reason, kids have been bringing in change.

"They think it's fun to bring pennies in and put them in a jar," she said.

"It's teaching them the concept of sharing."

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Copyright (c) 2006, Eagle Times, Claremont, N.H.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: Eagle Times, Claremont, New Hampshire

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