Higher Heights Human Services Inc. held its fifth annual Adopt-A-Teen event Thursday night to help support teen mothers in Beaufort County.

Executive Director Loretta Ebison, who was a teen mother herself, founded Higher Heights, as she wanted to use her experience to help others in the community.

As part of the organization’s Adopt-A-Teen program, members of the community were asked to adopt one of the roughly 15 teen mothers with Higher Heights then provide Christmas gifts of baby supplies. Some of the gifts donated were blankets, diapers, formula and bottles.

Thursday night’s event featured breakfast food cooked by First Baptist Church’s Brothers in the Field men’s group, as well as speakers from Higher Heights and women who have been helped by their services.

“We have been working on this for two months,” said Janae Johnson, who planned and led the event.

She said Higher Heights was able to cut some of the costs related to Adopt-A-Teen as compared to years past, especially by enlisting the cooking skills of Brothers in the Field. Catering for the event is usually about $800, but hiring the men’s group cut that cost in half and they also offered the church facility, Johnson said.

“Once we got the food and the venue, it was kind of easier from there,” she said. Johnson has participated in Adopt-A-Teen before, but this is the first year she was leading the event.

One of Higher Heights’ main goals is to keep teen mothers in school during pregnancy and afterward, and Johnson said the Adopt-A-Teen program is meant to be a reward for hard work and give those teen mothers a boost.

She said she checks the school attendance of the mothers in the program and holds them accountable for their grade performance, which then determines whether they can participate in Adopt-A-Teen.

“This is kind of a jumpstart for them,” Johnson said. “If they do extremely well we can reward them with that.”

Paradise Weston, 18, is a Belhaven resident and attends Beaufort County Ed Tech. She is also seven months pregnant.

Weston said becoming a young mother is difficult, and having some sort of support is of the utmost importance.

She said she just started attending Higher Heights group meetings at Ed Tech, and having that time to spend with peers going through the same experience will help, too.

“Being a teen mom can be impossible if you don’t have anyone supporting you,” Weston said.

“It think it’s good to raise awareness for the community,” Johnson said. “We’re a program that’s going to help them stay in school. … We encourage them and help them.”