Whirlpool (the appliance manufacturer) donated washers and driers to schools and increased attendance.
According to Whirlpool's research, one in five school children report difficulty finding clean clothes to wear to school. It turns out that offering free in-school laundry services to kids with attendance problems increases their attendance.
When compared to factors like economic opportunity, unemployment, and institutional racism, laundry seems pretty inconsequential in the fight to keep kids in school. But while that might be the case for their parents, for a ten-year-old who already has the odds stacked against them, having nothing clean to wear to school could be the deciding factor in whether or not they want to face their classmates that day.
I can remember my grandmother telling me that she thought lunches in schools were a wonderful innovation, because they didn't have anything like that when she was a girl, and many children couldn't come because they wouldn't have lunch. I'm sure back then nobody thought of lunch as something school should provide. Now apparently laundry is the next big innovation.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Thursday August 18 2016, @12:41AM
We don't have enough information in front of us to indicate what percentage of affected kids have crack-addicted parent(s).
More likely, the fact that many states offer a minimum wage below the poverty line means that low-educated but hard working parents trying to do their best simply can't afford those things that we take for granted. Food, or laundry? Books, or hot water?
I would be very interested to see a state-by-state comparison of minimum wage levels versus percentage of people living in poverty (or using this laundry service)...