McDowell County Schools deliver hope and teddy bears to students affected by flooding

MCDOWELL COUNTY, WV (WVVA)

Schools across McDowell County remain closed because of flooding, but Assistant Superintendent Amanda Peyton says faculty and staff are going above and beyond to help students recover.

She stated, “Our principals and our staff are reaching families by phone that we can reach, and they’re checking on the status of those children. Do you have power? Do you have water? Did you have significant damage, and that will allow us to figure out what families that we are not able to reach, we’ll go out to do home visits for those, and then if they were significantly impacted, we’ll prioritize those visits first.”

And those visits aren’t just check-ins—they’re bringing comfort, thanks to a teddy bear drive.

“We have put together a teddy bear drive and the teddy bear and it’s just a new best friend, a new clean teddy bear that we are going to take on home visits to our students,” said Peyton.

The idea for the teddy bear giveaway comes from a children’s book.

Peyton says, “We found the book Flood of kindness and it’s a little story about a little girl who loses everything in a flood, and she goes to a shelter, since she gives her teddy bear to another little boy in the shelter who’s lost his best friend. So, it just paying it forward and getting our students to understand that we care about them, we’re excited to bring them back to school and give them a new best friend along the way.”

For Peyton, an alumna of McDowell County Schools, the outpouring of support is a powerful reminder of the community’s strength.

“It’s been powerful to see how the community has stepped up. I mean, even just donating all of the teddy bears. We had folks from all across the country,” said Peyton. “But, when you see those people who once lived here giving back, it’s really inspiring. You have people local, you know, people who have lost things, but they still were able to donate a teddy bear, or 10 teddy bears or 20 teddy bears. Seeing the resilience of our families and of our communities has been really inspiring.”

Faculty and staff will do welfare check along with handing out teddy bears starting this Monday, March 3rd.

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