Jackson Free Press

JACKSON — Third-graders at Jackson Public Schools' North Jackson Elementary School received a lesson beyond reading, writing and arithmetic today: separating, loading and folding. Red-shirted students on one side competed against their white-shirted classmate adversaries to see who could separate laundry, fill the washer and fold shirts fastest. After a shaky start, the white team rallied and managed to overcome the red team in the end.

In conjunction with JPS' Partners in Education, a program that connects schools with community partners, Conn's HomePlus, a Houston-based furniture and home-goods retailer, donated a new matching Samsung washer and dryer to the school. To celebrate, the company hosted the relay-race laundry lesson.

"We believe kids at any age can lend a helping hand at home, and this is a great way to teach kids how they can give their parents or caregivers help in another kind of 'homework,'" Conn's HomePlus CEO Norm Miller said in a JPS press release.

The life skill does more than take the load off busy parents. Having a washer and dryer in schools directly affects student attendance and classroom success, especially for students whose families don't have access to laundry machines. Whirlpool, a company famous for its washers and dryers, started its Care Counts program last year in response to kids staying home from school because they did not have clean clothes to wear. In Whirlpool's first year of installing washers and dryers in schools, 93 percent of participating students saw increased attendance, and at-risk students attended almost two more weeks of school than they had the prior school year.

PTA president Michelle Henry, who served as master of ceremonies for the relay race, is extremely thankful for the opportunity the in-house laundry appliances gives to kids.

"Through no circumstances of their own, some of our scholars come to school, and their uniforms are not clean," she told the Jackson Free Press. "And since we serve students aged four to 11, sometimes some of our scholars might still have accidents. This way instead of waiting while we call in adults, we can take care of them and their needs immediately."

Alijah Watson, 8, says he was happy to participate in the laundry-lesson relay today, but that for him, it was a refresher course. His 9-year-old sister taught him how to wash and dry clothes after he spilled tea on one of his white shirts.

Watson says knowing how to do laundry is an important life skill. "If you get old and your son or daughter has an accident (with their clothes), you can teach them and make them ready for everyday life," he told the Jackson Free Press.

Sierra Mannie is an education reporting fellow at the Jackson Free Press and The Hechinger Report. Email her at [email protected].