This week was an interesting week. I feel like teaching another person is very hard but amazing at the same time because you are projecting your knowledge onto another person. To start me and Raechel decided to work together since we are in the same sorority. We came together and decided that our audience was going to be all of our sisters at one of our Sunday meetings. Our procedure we decided was going to be asking them their views on homelessness, what resources they think are available, and the language used surrounding the Homelss community. As we started to plan we noticed that most of our friends were in the library and we decided to change who we were tailoring our teaching project to. We decided to teach our friends and sisters as they passed by in the library. We wanted to focus on these topics because they are very important in understanding homelessness. If we want to teach others we have to start with the basics and work our way up. When we talked to our friends we noticed them all using similar words. tThey would use words like they are dirty, poor, crazy, drunk, and sad, This is not all of the Homelss population. we went on to explain that some do go through different mood swings due to not talking to anyone and being lonely, mental health issues, and some are on drugs and that does alter their personalities. We also went on to explain that there are three different types of homelessness. We started with chronic which is the least common type. This is when they are homeless for a longer amount of time due to a specific situation. Next is transitional homeless. This means that they stay at a shelter for a set time due to a catastrophic event int heir life. This is the most common type of homelessness. The last is episodic which means they frequently go in and out of homelessness. When we taught about this we also taught about different resources available. Together we talked about 211 which is a hotline to give available resources. Another resource is the HOPE officers. This gave them a new look to officers. They started to have a a open mind towards some officers because some do end u0 helping the Homelss protecting them and providing them resources. When we mentioned this they told us they thought that churches always had open doors and available resources to keep taking people in. They also thought that food is always being donated and used. Some places use the food and are always needing more but some places do not use the canned food that they have in their pantry which is terrible. We also had to explain that the government does not do to much ti help the cities decrease homelessness. Overall our students learned that homelessness is very diverse. People range in race and age. They also learned about all the different resources and that their are Homelss counts done.

For my each-one-teach-one teaching project, I decided to lead a workshop in Outdoor Programs to my fellow trip leaders and apprentices’. I chose this group of people because I wanted to speak with a group of people who choose to sleep outside willingly about groups of people that sleep outside unwillingly. I ended up leading two workshops. The first workshop was a quick overview of homelessness at our weekly Monday night meeting and the second workshop was a more in-depth conversation the following Tuesday afternoon. On Tuesday afternoon, only four trip leaders from Outdoor Programs showed up to talk about homelessness which was disappointing but worked out well. We started off by discussing stereotypes, moved into causes of homelessness, and ended with ways to prevent homelessness. The stereotypes we talked about were the general stereotypes we think of when we think of homeless people: drug addicts, lazy, could work if they tried to get a job, that it’s their choice that they’re homeless, etc. Our conversation about stereotypes led into a brief conversation about the language we use surrounding homelessness and I told them that it was important to try and not victim blame and to search for the structural reasons behind homelessness. When we talked about causes of homelessness, I was surprised to hear that no one brought up affordable housing. Even without them taking our class, I assumed it would be mentioned since affordable housing is such a buzzword nowadays. However, most of the causes they talked about had to do with mental illness, high medical costs/lack of insurance, economic depressions, and systemic oppression against people of color. These themes came up again when we talked about ways to prevent homelessness as they brainstormed a lot of things that would require policy changes. For example, the idea of free healthcare or more affordable services for people who are struggling.

I enjoyed leading my two workshops but definitely liked the Tuesday one better, just because we got to have a small group discussion where everyone shared their opinions and ideas. It was exciting to be able to teach my peers and have them look at a social issue (homelessness) in a new way. I think they learned a lot about the lack of affordable housing we are facing and how easy it can be for individuals to become homeless. I encouraged them to not look away the next time they see a homeless person and to try and understand that everyone has a different situation that led them to homelessness. If we start acknowledging the homeless people we see every day, maybe the problem will begin to humanize itself again and we won’t hear people speak about homeless people in such a negative way. I would call this teaching project a success but I wish that I had more time to plan and prepare because I think I could have reached more people in Outdoor Programs, which would have been nice, but I’m happy with the outcome of the project regardless.

I partnered with one of my classmates Jordin for our Each One Teach One project. Our project focused on educating people on the basic facts about homelessness and trying to break stereotypes. We felt that this class has really taught us a lot about the homeless population and has broken several stereotypes throughout the course of the semester, which is exactly why we felt more people should be educated on the things this course teaches. For our project we originally were going to present to both of our sororities, but then we thought why limit it? We felt that tabling in front of the Commons would allow us to reach a larger population and to students who were “available.” By available we mean that they were students who had the free time to speak with us and who actually wanted to learn more, rather than forcing someone to sit through a presentation. For our table we printed out photos ranging from different homeless people on the streets and different statistics about the homeless. Our game was more so trying to gage how much people actually knew about the homeless so we had a series of questions written on one side of the paper with the answer on the back. Then we would ask them to guess what the answer would be to see how much they knew about homelessness before we flipped the card over for the answer and informed them even more about the answer. Our two biggest questions that we had people answer were “What do you think is the main cause of homelessness?” and “If you see a homeless person on the street, even they were simply napping what number do you call?” We also had other questions, but these were the two most popular questions that gathered the most response and largest attraction from the people we spoke with. When we asked people if they knew what number to call if they see a homeless person most either said 911 or said they had no idea. When we told them about the “511” number most people were surprised and no idea that number existed in the San Bernardino County. I personally think this was my favorite part of teaching people because I remember when the police officers taught us this I was so taken back and had no idea. It is such a simple number to remember, so if we taught them anything during our teaching project and if only one thing stuck with them I truly hope it was this number. Now when we asked people what they thought was the main cause of homelessness, most people naturally said drugs. We actually had over 10 people say drugs, the most out of any other category. I have to say though, that before taking this class I probably would have said the same answer had someone asked me. The next most popular answer was mental illness, and people assuming that mental illness is what led to people being homeless. My favorite answer we received though, that didn’t just simply scratch the surface, was one person saying the leading causes of homelessness is because of food deserts, bad government funding, and expensive education (college). These answers were all interesting to here because I believe if we would have taken a poll at the beginning of the semester in our class about what we thought were the main causes of homelessness each of us would have had similar answers. The overall experience of this assignment was rather rewarding. This assignment allowed to me to reflect on how I kind of was and the way I was thinking about the homeless when I first began this class. Some of the students had surprising guesses to our questions, while others had really surprising things to say about the homeless. Everyone has different opinions in regards to the homeless, but overall I believe we had a fairly good response rate. Students were engaged and wanted to actually hear about what we had to say.

Because I enjoy approaching people in public and asking them questions, I decided to “quiz” fellow students around campus with questions pertaining to homelessness. Said questions are listed below (the correct answers to questions 1-6 are shown in bold):
1. Out of all the cities in San Bernardino County, Redlands had the ______ amount of homeless people in 2017.
Highest
Second highest
Third highest
Second least
Least
2. The two factors that are mostly responsible for the rise of homelessness are:
Drug addiction and decreasing levels of motivation
Mental illness and increases in poverty
A shortage of affordable housing and increases in poverty
The erosion of family ties and a shortage of affordable housing
Lack of health insurance and student debt
3. The average life expectancy among homeless people compared to that of non-homeless people is….
about the same
about 5 years longer
about 10 years shorter
about 30 years shorter
about 45 years shorter
4. About ________ youth are homeless on any given night, and about _______ of them are LGBTQ.
100,000; 20%
750,000,000; 30%
1 million; 35%
D. 1.3 million; 40%
E. 1.8 million; 50%
5. African-Americans make up about 12.5% of the general population. They comprise about ______ of the national homeless population.
12.5%
10%
18%
30%
40%
6. There are about 9,800,000 people living in LA County. How many of them are homeless? Give your best guess. (around 57,000 is the answer, that is, according to counts)
7. What do you think is the definition of “homeless?”
8. If you had $100,000,000 to help address homelessness, what would you do with it? (Questions 7 and 8 are obviously subjective and have no “correct” answers, however I would say that there are “more correct” responses to them.)
Upon approaching people, I would ask them politely, albeit confidently, if they wanted to participate in a quiz about homelessness, and that they would be placed in a raffle to win either some candy, a book about homelessness, or an exclusive discussion about homelessness facilitated by me should they choose to participate. If an individual agreed to participate, I would ask them one question at a time, wait for them to answer, and then tell them whether or not they were right or wrong immediately after their response.
I conducted the raffle process by assigning every participant a number, which was very easy because I wrote down every participant’s name and number after they took my quiz. I then used a random number generating app to select six “winning” participants: one to be awarded with candy, another with a book, and four others with a discussion.
I have so far contacted every “winner,” and have already facilitated the discussion. Thinking that people wouldn’t want to stay for long since we are in the heat of pre-finals week, I told those that “won” the discussion that they were only expected to stay for about 20 minutes or so. Boy, did I underestimate their generosity with time! We talked about the theories posed by Willse in The Value of Homelessness, the notion of attributing homelessness to situations vs. dispositions, structural changes in the job market, and the debate concerning whether change should come from the federal vs. the local level for about and hour and a half.
My teaching project has yet to conclude since I still need to give the candy and the book on homelessness to their respective recipients. But does the process of teaching and learning ever conclude?

Although my original plans for my teaching project unfortunately fell through, I was able to utilize one of my other classes as the subject of my project. As a double major in SOAN and Political Science, I try to take as many classes that can overlap in content as I can. The class I presented to is certainly one of those courses: SOAN-221, Rethinking Politics with Professor Coles. The class has been focused on processes and institutions of power as well as containing themes of governance and human rights. And in the class, we always come back ideas of hegemony discussed mainly by Antonio Gramsci. For our end of the year presentations, we were given the opportunity to expand on some current political issues, and evaluate how it connects to matters of hegemony, power, and governance. The title of my presentation was “Undercounting America’s Homeless Population.” This was one of my favorite topics from our Hunger and Homelessness class this semester, and it seemed like the perfect representation of a marginalized population, daily affected by social and political institutions of power and governance out of their control. The presentation was in a rotating poster format, where 1/3 of the class would present and the other 2/3 of the class would walk around the classroom, observing and asking questions of the presenters. The only problem I identified with this was the lack of time each presenter had. I definitely felt rushed to explain all of my main points while also leaving time for people to inquire as to the more interesting or quizzical parts of my presentation. Nevertheless, I felt incredibly comfortable and confident sharing all of my knowledge about homeless counts. My classmates were very intrigued by the topic and were shocked to hear that this is such a large issue across the country. They were also very understanding of how all of the different aspects of the problem interconnect and create incredibly negative results for homeless individuals. They asked questions about the role of government, both federal and local in intentionally or unintentionally undercounting the homeless. They also commented on how they had never heard of this phenomenon before, and how they hoped people would become more aware of it. It was very rewarding to know that people moved on from my poster with some new, valuable information. This was my intention with the project, to make people more aware of a problem that is sometime hidden from view. I think I was able to present this in a way that was not overwhelming, but was also was informational enough to stick with people beyond the one class period. This project also showed me how much I have learned about homelessness this semester, especially with regard to homeless counts.

For my teaching project I decided to skype my family and talk to them about some of the root causes of homelessness. I was originally going to a report on Redlands/ San Bernardino area. I was going to talk about the area specific problems and policy. Then I changed my mind because I thought about my audience better. My dad is a politically engaged person and I thought it would be more likely to be a meaningful discussion with him if we talked about government root causes of homelessness. So I took information we got in our readings, discussions, and during class and made a verbal presentation ment to get him engaged. My mom is an occupational therapist and has worked with a variety of jobs, the majority having clients with different mental and physical disabilities. Many of her jobs have been at schools with kids who come from low-income families. I also made sure to talk about mental illness and addiction as susceptibility factors in homelessness because I knew that would catch her attention and she would have more things to say. As I suspected my dad would always flip the argument on me- for example when I was talking about Clinton’s Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 and how it reached less people, he talked about how that was intentional, the program existed to motivate people to get back into jobs because you were only able to get assistance if you were employed or taking steps in your education to reach that.He talked about how if you were not able to find a job the government would give you one. I thought there was definitely some merit to his point. But I responded by explaining that homelessness need more help than that to actually fix the problem. There are other factors that could prevent someone from participating in this program like mental illness, transportation, family circumstances, location, and following a bunch of rules and regulations is not always the best route to go.

If I could do this project again I would change some of the details in the way that I presented my information. I think that I was very used to our classroom setting where we have the background knowledge to automatically be sympathetic to situations. I think that I started the discussion with some very strong opinions and it was contant heavy. If I started with some background knowledge first I think it may have gone slightly smoother. Overall I enjoyed our conversation. I think it’s important to have these discussions with family even when it gets difficult. The disagreements are valuable because we will never make progress just preaching to the choir. I learned that I need to look at my arguments closer and take my opinions out a little and incorporate a more whole explanation of what I’m trying to say. My dad had many points that he was able to counter mine with because I failed to look at the whole picture. For example, Clinton’s plan, how globalization in many ways is a good thing, and the flaws of unions. While simple, I believe the discussion was successful in making people who don’t normally have to think about homelessness pause and get a new perspective, which was my goal.

Homelessness often receives a negative connotation when you talking about the community amongst peers, friends, and family.  Most lack the compassionate nature when it comes to the community and forget that they are human too.  For this teaching project, I teamed up with Madisun to explore the perspectives and resources that our friends have of the homeless community.  To do this we thought we would go to our sorority and explore their views and what resources they believed were available to the homeless community.  First, we thought we would go to the sorority house or do it before a meeting but then we realized that the library would be a better place.  We are continuously running into people and it gave us the flexibility to do it with not only our sorority but our other friends who would also be walking through.  We chose to focus on this aspect of the course because a majority of people have surface views what the homeless community is and it is questionable whether or not they know of resources that may be available to them.  I went into this thinking that people would have negative views and know little about the resources that are available to the community.  To do this project we presented our audience with a powerpoint and wrote what they viewed and thought onto the slide.  Some of the views that were shared include: dirty, drunk, and crazy.  After these views were shared we went into describing the three different types of homeless: chronic, transitional, and episodic.  Next, we asked what they resources they thought were available.  Some thought food drives, government services, and churches.  We then described a couple of resources that are available to the community.  We spoke on the 2-1-1 hotline, HOPE cops, and a number of organizations that treat the diversity within the homeless community. At the end of the lesson, we asked some takeaways or what they learned from our teaching lesson.  For the types of homelessness, people walked away with realizing that there is a diversity within the community.  They were able to see the different ways in which the homeless community can be.  They also realized that they tend to generalize the community into one specific category. We were able to discuss the different kinds of people that tend to be homeless. Whether they were families, veterans, or single parents.  When we discussed resources they asked whether or not the HOPE cops were actually helpful for the community.  I brought up the fact that the people often have to be willing to change but it is not a 100% thing.  After this discussion, they realized that they were helpful but understand that it does not always work.  Through this, they also gained an understanding that no one really likes to be told what to do.  On the 2-1-1 hotline, they did not realize that the hotline even existed. With this, they see that if they come across someone in need they would know what to do. 

I decided to research the stats and causes of homelessness for veterans and teach it to my family. I wanted to see who homeless veterans were, and some of the different reasons, beyond the causes of general homelessness, that causes homelessness in the veteran population. I have an interest in the topic because I hope to join the military after college, specifically in trauma care field, and the people I may be interacting with or helping could end up homeless because of any injuries they may sustain, mental disorders, or issues with the system that makes it challenging for them to find employment once they return to the civilian world. I hoped to accomplish learning something myself in my research, but also, I hoped that I could teach my family something about homelessness in general and about veteran homelessness specifically and the challenges that come with the issues they face when returning from war. I used aspects of the course material when describing some of the general causes of homelessness such as lack of affordable housing and lack of a livable minimum wage. Within the stats on veteran homelessness I also included some stats on the general homeless population for comparison. I chose these specific aspects of the course material because I did not believe that my family is aware of the more deep-rooted systemic issues that cause homelessness. It was also relevant information to go over before talking about some of the stats and causes of homelessness among the veteran population. Overall the teaching effort was a success in my eyes. It was definitely outside of my comfort zone, which I suspect is the point, but my family was receptive to the information and polite in their questions and observations. I presented a PowerPoint with information I had researched and taken from the course and that format worked well, especially over Skype where I feel the visual aid helped keep me on topic and allowed my family to focus on the information I was presenting. I first asked them a couple questions to understand what their personal ideas on homelessness were which I don’t feel went very well. I left the questions to broad and somewhat generic and so I got broad and generic responses. At the end I asked if they had any questions which sparked a much larger discussion than I was expecting and was somewhat gratifying to know they had an interest in the topic beyond just helping me with an assignment. This project was a stretch for me; I dislike presenting to people because I always get incredibly nervous. Overall though I feel, ultimately it was a good experience to have. It was gratifying as well to know my family had an interest in the topic of homelessness and veteran homelessness because I was unsure how they would receive it but they were willing and able to hold an in depth discussion afterwards which I appreciated.

For my teaching project I wrote an article to be published in the student led newspaper, the Redlands Bulldog. Entitled “We Should All Be Paying Attention to the Homeless in L.A.” The purpose of my project had several facets. I first, wanted to teach people about the ways in which language frames social issues. Language is an integral way in which our society constructs social issues, and, more importantly, language limits and defines the parameters of what solutions are permitted for those social issues. Dehumanizing language is responsible for the leaf blower approach we see so commonly undertaken by municipal and county governments. To underline this point I included a report on the displacement of 700 homeless individuals from Orange County. Therefore, my analysis of language also included a critique of policy response.
Second, I wanted to show others that homelessness is not a consequence of individual failure. The construction of American Society, predicated on neoliberal ideology has created the condition of homelessness. I included a report linking rising rents to the number of people living on the street. Further, it was important to me to link identity, as well as class, to the reality faced by those living on the street. There are racial elements as well as elements that disproportionately affect members of the LGBTQ+ community.
I chose to public in the Bulldog for a few reasons. Most important is that we are at an “elite” institution. College students and faculty are no doubt part of the socioeconomic elite in this nations and often times institutions such as this university can cause people to lose touch with the real lives of many Americans. I included statistics, data, and structural analysis because I thought that to be the sort of content that may influence the minds of the intellectually elite.
Publishing my teaching project was limiting in that I received nominal face-to-face response to my piece. Upon posting about my article on my Facebook I accumulated 18 responses, which was nice to know that so many people had indeed read my writing. In person I had a few conversations about it, and I received a few first bumps in passing.
My article did succeed in stimulating conversation among a few students on campus. I had one particular interaction with a Redlands junior who had just been having a similar conversation about language as framing social issues and policy responses with a visiting professor. However, to the extent of my knowledge, my article failed to change any opinions. I presume as much because I received no push back or negative response concerning what I had written.
Therefore, if I were to do this project again I would definitely seek dissention. I know several conservatives on campus who would have disagreed with my opinions very much. Actively seeking a response from an organization such as the Young Republicans club could have gone a long way to help me understand how my project fits into the larger discussions on inequality poverty and neoliberal governance happening on this campus and throughout the United States. Additionally, I wish I could have recruited several faculty members to poll their students on my work. The piece was short for a reason.

Over the course of this semester, my views on the homeless community have been significantly widened and I have become a more empathetic person. Growing up in San Bernardino, homeless encounters were a normal thing and I brushed them off without a second thought. Now, I think to myself “this person has a story you don’t know about” with every homeless individual I see. The last time I was walking the streets of Skid Row in LA was about 2 months ago, and I had a new perspective towards the people on the street. I had so much respect for them and took in the diversity around me, while also being saddened because I now know about their displacement and how difficult it is. Being immersed in a social problems makes it go to your heart more, so teaching/showing people these situations can make an impact. I didn’t have someone telling me about homeless life and homeless people in high school, other than they were lazy and would only use any money I gave them to feed an addiction. Kids are impressionable, and need to be told more than one perspective. So for my teaching project, I went to Yucaipa High School and overviewed the 5 main questions we answered over the semester with 2 AP Human Geography classes. I told them alternative reasons to homelessness outside substance abuse, what organizations are doing to help, and that it could happen to anyone. The lesson I hope they took home was do not be quick to judge and do not slander those who need some help. The homeless community faces enough shame, but with every child we can teach to be more tolerant and accepting, the better we can treat one another.