Help Spread Joy to a Low-income Family This Holiday Season!

By MB -
Each year PathWays PA provides residential and social services to over 6,000 low-income women, children and families in the Greater Philadelphia region. While these services provide opportunities for our clients to move along the path to self-sufficiency, the holiday season can still be a very trying time. With this in mind and the holidays just around the corner, PathWays PA is gearing up for our annual Adopt-a-Family giving program.

Adopt-a-Family is designed to help needy families by matching them with donors, both individual and corporate, who are eager to provide gifts and other living essentials to their adopted family. Matches are based on a client family’s size and the age of their children. After being paired up with a client family, a wish list is sent to the donors with the receiving family's genders, ages, clothing sizes and their holiday wishes. The donor family is free to purchase any or all of the items on the clients' list, or substitute items that they feel the client may enjoy. We also encourage the gifting of non-perishable food baskets, toiletries and other types of housewares..

Tamika Rahatt, a single mother of six and grandmother of one was thrilled to participate in the 2008 Adopt-a-Family program. Tamika, a Philadelphia resident, sought help from PathWays PA so she could get her GED; her involvement in the holiday giving program was an added bonus. “We really got a lot of nice stuff, things we needed,” says Tamika. Among the items received were a vacuum cleaner, comforters, toys for all of her children and her grandchild and a DVD player. “We can watch movies as a family now,” Tamika remarks happily.

Clients are not the only ones who benefit from the Adopt-a-Family program. Ellen Rosen, one of the many donors who participated last year, used the Adopt-a-Family program as a teambuilding exercise with her co-workers at the Bancorp Bank. “When I heard in December that charitable giving was down, I thought it would be better if we took the money we spent on holiday gifts for each other and used it instead to help a family in need,” Ellen says. “It was a fun way to give back to the community and we definitely will participate again!”

The road to self-sufficiency is difficult, but thanks to the generous contributions of local donors, the holiday season is no longer a burden for low-income moms and their families. Instead, our clients are afforded the opportunity to bask in holiday cheer and create special memories that they can share with their loved ones for years to come.

Click here to Adopt-a-Family or call Pam Przybylski, Adopt-a-Family Coordinator, at 610-534-5022 x234.

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