Emmanuel “Manny” Ohonme wants to live in a “world with zero shoeless children.” The Institute for Citizenship, spearheaded by citizenship teacher Mr. Jason Hills, will help Manny and his organization, Samaritan’s Feet, achieve their goal beginning in January by collecting new athletic footwear for underprivileged children.

Since the nonprofit’s founding in 2003, Samaritan’s Feet has collected 6.5 million athletic shoes towards their goal of 10 million. Now, Manny is setting his sights on eliminating this problem globally.

At 9 years old, Manny was an underprivileged child living in Nigeria who won athletic shoes in a competition hosted by a missionary. After obtaining a basketball scholarship to Lake Region State College and earning his business degree, Manny gave it all up in order to help provide children with shoes, much like himself.

It was the large-scale nature of the project and its lofty goal that caught the attention of Mr. Hills.

“I was so impressed by just the massive scale of what [Manny] was doing,” Mr. Hills said. “They don’t just want to put shoes on the feet of people who are barefoot. They want to give them dignity.”

Mr. Hills first noticed Manny’s work while helping a sophomore class at Providence Day School in North Carolina sort and package thousands of illegally sold shoes that had been confiscated by Homeland Security.

Although the St. George’s community is just now becoming involved in Samaritan’s Feet, other local nonprofits have already done work with them. According to Lipscomb Pitts Breakfast Club President, Mr. Jeremy Park, his organization has been working with Samaritan’s Feet since 2010 and have hosted two events each year. During these events, hundreds of volunteers sign up to wash feet and put athletic shoes on around 300 children.

Mr. Michael Drake, who has participated in these events, values the chance “to sit in front of a young person and serve them.” According to Mr. Drake, Samaritan’s Feet reminds him that “children are children regardless of their socioeconomic background.”

The Samaritan’s Feet athletic footwear drive will be open to all members of the St. George’s community, including parents. The athletic footwear must be new, but discounted shoes are highly encouraged.

The Institute plans to launch this drive in collaboration with their existing collection of used footwear during the winter months. The shoes can be brought to the dining hall after Christmas break where bins will be placed for collection.

Mr. Hills has high hopes for the Samaritan’s Feet athletic footwear drive.

“If the school really embraces this effort, I could see us doing even bigger things down the road,” Mr. Hills said.