They worked for their money.
“I helped my mom out with my little brother and changed his diaper,” says Haile Smith, who's 9.
“I cleaned out my closet,” said Lanesha Caldwell, who's 9. “I can put my clothes in there but sometimes I don't put them in right.”
Willie Harper, who's 6, is thinking hard. “I took the trash out to the backyard,” he says. Then his eyes get big. “Oh, and I made up my bed!”
There are 25 kids in the after-school program here in Southside Homes, one of Charlotte's last public housing projects. These kids come from low-income families, families who get help from the government, families that some people grumble don't want to work and live only for themselves.
For the past week these kids from Southside Homes have been doing chores at home.
Their families gave them 50 cents apiece. And they are giving that 50 cents to charity.
This idea came from the YWCA Central Carolinas, which runs 11 of these after-school programs in Mecklenburg County and two in Union County. When school lets out, the programs turn into summer camps.
The kids here at Southside on Thursday afternoon range from age 5 to 10. They sit up in their seats and eat fruit cups. They don't talk unless I ask them what they did for their money.
“I cleaned up after my hamster,” says Teonnia Taylor, who's 8.
The kids in the after-school programs read Shel Silverstein's book “The Giving Tree.” They made giving trees of their own. Then they went out into the community. The kids at Southside Homes went to elderly neighbors and took out their trash. They found other little kids and gave them Popsicles.
“It's little stuff, but we hope they remember it when they get out on their own,” says LaQuisha Washington, site coordinator for the Southside program. “We teach that anyone can help and you can do anything if we work together.”
At the front of the class is an envelope. It represents Laquayzia Benton washing the dishes, and Sanchez Cherry taking the clothes upstairs, and Kyana Johnson sweeping the porch, and all the others.
It represents 25 kids earning their money and then giving it all away.
The envelope contains 18 dollars.
You might notice that 18 dollars for 25 kids adds up to more than 50 cents apiece. A couple of kids had extra and so they gave it.
One of those kids is Ariyanna Brown. She's 8. One of her cousins was a 13-year-old named Shcrissony Potts. Two weeks ago, Shcrissony was on her bike, out on South Tryon Street, when she ran into the side of a school bus.
In the midst of the mourning, Ariyanna and the other Southside kids did their work and collected their money and maybe learned how to live a life that means something when they grow up.
Shcrissony was just a few years older than they are.
There's a dollar in the envelope in memory of her.
ttomlinson@charlotteobserver.com;
704-358-5227; Tommy's Table blog http://ttomlinson.blogspot.com
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