Students from St. Ambrose University are hosting a community awareness event and are seeking volunteers. The purpose of this event is for community members to be given a scenario and experience life with a shortage of money and an abundance of stress. The point of this event is for participants to leave with new insight on what some families within the community may be experiencing on a regular basis.
Volunteers, are recruited to staff the resource tables. Roles at the resource tables may be utility collector, pawnbroker, grocer, mortgage/rent collector, Quick Cash manager, two social service caseworkers, a social service receptionist, Community Action worker, employer, child care worker, schoolteacher, faith-based agency staffer, community health care staff, and bank/loan collector and some may assume the roles of police officer and an “illegal activities” person. An overview of the simulation will be given prior to the simulation taking place at 10 am to assigned roles and responsibilities. Each volunteer will be given instruction packets at that time. The experience lasts from two and a half to three hours. The experience is divided into four 15-minute sessions, each of which represents one week in where participants must provide for their family and maintain their home. There will be an introduction and briefing, the actual simulation exercise, and a debriefing period in which participants and volunteer staffers share their feelings and experiences and talk about what they have learned about the lives of people in poverty.
To sign up to volunteer please email Emma Wolf at weisemma@sau.edu with your name, a reminder email will be sent 2 days before the event.
