With winter fast approaching and temperatures falling, Georgetown student groups have been raising support for the homeless people living in the area.
As part of Hoya Outreach Programs & Education’s Hunger and Homelessness week, the Georgetown Student Secular Alliance participated in a Hunger March in D.C. on Nov. 16. Students made a total of 200 sandwiches to distribute to the homeless around the city.
Other events organized by the Hoya Outreach Programs & Education throughout the week included a Faces of Homelessness Panel featuring speakers from the National Coalition for the Homeless, an issue of the month dinner with Georgetown Ministry Center’s Stephanie Chan, a knitting session to make scarves for the needy, and a poetry performance.
HOPE also held a Solidarity Sleep Out as the final event of the week to make students more aware of what goes on outside the campus gates. The event raised $725, which was more than the past two years, for Covenant House, a youth homeless center in NoMa.
Eighteen students attended the event, and ten slept out on the mid-level terrace by Leavey Center due to rain.
“It’s important to understand that sleeping out like that and being uncomfortable for one night is not the same thing [as actually being homeless],” Gianna Maita (COL ’15), co-coordinator of the Solidarity Sleep Out, said. “Just imagine that experience times about one hundred. [The homeless] don’t have the safety of Georgetown’s campus.”
One such homeless person is Robert, a veteran who had been homeless for two months before recently acquiring an apartment. He still roams up and down M Street to raise money for transportation to access possible job opportunities.
“I ask for assistance, but most people, when they come by, they look away,” Robert said. He demonstrated by holding out a cup and asking a passing couple for spare change. The woman quietly apologized, while the man glanced in the opposite direction.
“Veterans were asked for help first and we answered the call, but when I make a request, people just come up with excuses,” Robert said.
When asked what he does to prepare for the winter, Robert said, “Just get a bunch of blankets and pray to the grace of God.”
