Homelessness Essay, Research Paper
Homelessness
There is a homeless problem in the United States, as well as in the world and it will not go away. In fact, it is getting much worse every year. One of the reasons this is not a popular topic to talk about is that we live in the “greatest country in the world”, and we have tens of thousands of men, women and children wandering our streets with no place to call home. This is not someone else’s problem. This is America’s problem, and we must find a way to solve it. To help those people, we can do volunteer activities, we can contribute funds for them, and we can teach homeless people how to bring positive changes in policies and programs on the local, state, and federal levels.
Working directly with homeless people is one of the best ways to learn about homelessness. We can work at a shelter perhaps an evening or overnight shift to help homeless people with clerical work: answer phones, type, file, sort mail, serve food, wash dishes, and sort or distribute clothes. We can offer them your professional skills and services directly or to assist in job training: secretarial, catering, plumbing, accounting, management, carpentry, tutoring, public relations, fundraising, legal, medical, dentistry, writing, child care, counseling, etc. We can share our hobbies to teach them as a group, or work one-to-one with a homeless person. We can also help their children by working with program directors that are coordinating field trips, picnics or art workshops for homeless children.
While the concern and support demonstrated by volunteer work are essential, material help is a necessity too. The end of homelessness is a long road to go; in the meantime, homeless people and those running agencies need help every day. First of all, homeless people need clothes, which has to be look neat and clean. It doesn’t matter if they are used or look new (only wore couple of times). When they have neat looking clothes, they will have more chances to get success on job interview; otherwise, they will have very little chances of success. We can also donate household goods or other items: kitchen supplies, furniture, books, toys, games, stuffed animals, dolls, etc. we can raise funds for that program. To do that, we can ask our group to abstain from one meal and donate the proceeds to a shelter or soup kitchen; we can organize a bike, or a yard sale and donate the proceeds. Sponsor a benefit concert featuring local musicians (and also include homeless musicians on the program).
We can also help people to give them a rite to vote. We can also call legislative alerts (congress) to get the most up-to-date information about what is happening in Congress affecting homelessness to help them out. We can volunteer at our local, state, or national housing or homeless advocacy coalitions for the name of the coalition nearest us. Suppose if we cannot volunteer, send a donation, attend neighborhood and public meetings and speak up in favor of low-income housing, group homes, shelters, and homelessness prevention programs.
As you can see, there are many ways we can help homeless people. We have to learn to accept them in our society, and allow them the equal rights they give the general public. We have to equally help them out, so they won’t think that no body cares about them.