Samaritan’s Feet, OrthoCarolina Foundation and Charlotte-Mecklenburg High Schools Partner to Provide Shoes and Hope for Deserving Children

Charlotte, NC, February 11, 2012 --(PR.com)-- Samaritan’s Feet, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) and the OrthoCarolina Foundation are joining forces to foster the mission of Samaritan’s Feet, to provide new shoes and encouragement for children and families who need it most.

Nine high schools from CMS are participating in Samaritan’s Feet’s Barefoot Coaching campaign to raise awareness and funds for the 300 million children who wake every day in their bare feet or wear ill-fitting shoes. Coaches will coach in their bare feet and students will participate in their own unique ways to raise funds and bring attention to the cause.

The OrthoCarolina Foundation is partnering to multiply the efforts of this campaign, providing more shoes and encouragement for children in need. The OrthoCarolina Foundation has generously committed to matching funds raised by CMS high schools, up to $10,000.

Watch coaches walk the sidelines without shoes at the following basketball games:

Ardrey Kell High School – January 24th
Independence High School – January 27th
North Mecklenburg High School – January 27th
Vance High School and Mallard Creek High School – January 27th
Rocky River High School – February 3rd
East Mecklenburg High School – February 3rd
Butler High School – February 10th
Philip O. Berry Academy of Technology – TBD

“We are profoundly grateful to partner with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and the OrthoCarolina Foundation for this exciting project that will serve our neighbors in the Charlotte community,” said Manny Ohonme, founder and CEO of Samaritan’s Feet. “We are looking forward to a successful campaign and hope to grow this into an annual district-wide initiative to include all CMS middle and high school athletic programs in the coming years. This goes beyond raising funds for shoes – our goal is to use this campaign to further engage CMS athletes in modeling servant leadership through participation in our shoe distributions, which benefit underprivileged children across the community.”

Blair Primis, OrthoCarolina marketing and PR director adds, “The OrthoCarolina Foundation is excited to help make the campaign as successful as possible and give back to the community in such a profound way. We are fortunate to partner with Samaritan’s Feet to bring this initiative to life.”

“CMS coaches and students are pleased to participate in the Samaritan’s Feet Barefoot for Barefeet initiative and grateful for the matching commitment from the OrthoCarolina Foundation. Together, we look forward to growing the partnership and expanding opportunities for our coaches and students to give back to the community,” shares Sue Doran, director of athletics for CMS.

Proceeds from this campaign will fund shoe distributions as part of Samaritan’s Feet’s Back to Basics Initiative when CMS students head back to school this fall.

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Samaritan's Feet
Samaritan’s Feet is a 501(c)(3) humanitarian aid organization that shares a message of hope and love through washing the feet of impoverished children around the world and adorning them with new shoes. There are an estimated 300 million children who go without shoes every day and more than 1 million that die each year from foot borne disease. Our goal is to provide 10 million pairs of shoes for children in the next 10 years, and since 2003 Samaritan’s Feet and its team of 70,000 ambassadors have blessed an estimated 3.5 million children in over 62 nations.

Samaritan’s Feet was started in 2003 by Manny Ohonme who received his first pair of shoes at the age of 9 from a missionary. Those shoes allowed him to learn and play the game of basketball, which ultimately earned him a scholarship to the University of North Dakota (Lake Region). Manny went on to receive his Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees and pursued a successful career in supply chain software industries. A simple pair of shoes and the kindness and compassion shared by this missionary changed the course of Manny’s life.

Learn more at SamaritansFeet.org.

OrthoCarolina Foundation
OrthoCarolina’s emerging strengths in Clinical Excellence and Research are fostering an opportunity to give back to the wider medical community. As a result of our collaboration with other providers, healthcare systems, university research programs and equipment manufacturers we see the signal importance that continuous learning plays in providing the very best evidence based care to our patients. The OrthoCarolina Foundation draws its energy from this dynamic and seeks to amplify learning and education in our local medical community and in the world beyond. Learn more at OrthoCarolinafoundation.org

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools is a consolidated city-county district with 141,000 students from pre-kindergarten to grade 12. The district has been nationally recognized for its innovative and effective strategies to improve student achievement. CMS was the 2011 winner of the Broad Prize, the largest award in urban education, which recognizes districts for increasing overall achievement and narrowing the achievement gaps. With 17,000 employees and an annual budget of just over $1 billion, the district is the 18th largest in the U.S. and the second-largest in North Carolina.