The Waltonian

Have you ever walked in a city to see individuals lined up along the streets with nowhere to go? Have you stopped to think about what one person could do to assist a fellow human in the long term? According to statistics reported by the National Coalition for the Homeless, in April 2018, it was estimated that there were more than 550,000 homeless people on one night alone in 2017.

Within our own Eastern community, the activist ministry club, Youth Against Complacency in Homelessness Today, better known by the acronym Y.A.C.H.T, strives to embody the principles of combating systemic injustice through providing food and establishing positive communication with homeless individuals. In an interview with YACHT, leader Sarah Sweitzer allowed a closer look into how the Eastern community and beyond can contribute to addressing homelessness and a history of YACHT’s past, present and future activities.

“What I’ve been told is that in the 90’s, a group of people from Eastern went to the subway in Philly and just sat there with people who were experiencing homelessness. Sometimes they’d talk, sometimes they just sat there, because then the cops wouldn’t kick the homeless people back out onto the streets. Shane Claiborne was one of the original yacht people, if you know who that is” Sweitzer said.

With humble beginnings, Y.A.C.H.T continued to grow and eventually sought to provide food and began outings with Eastern sponsored vans to connect with homeless individuals.

“I’d say the advantages are that we get to develop relationships with people. They know when we’re there, and they know Eastern, and eventually friendships form” Sweitzer said.

A critical aspect of Y.A.C.H.T is fostering relationships among the homeless individuals who are often isolated from others around them and who experience loneliness and seclusion. As Sweitzer emphasized, “They laugh and talk to us. If nothing else, we know that they’re at least getting a meal that day, and that we were able to make them smile. Maybe God does even more through our outings that we don’t know about.” Other current activities that YACHT has done besides outings, includes the H.A.H.A week, which stands for Hunger and Homelessness Awareness initiative, with the goal of raising awareness of the ministry and homelessness in our area. Preparation that the club underwent included:

“Reserving spaces for events, like the ice cream fundraiser, contacting other groups on campus, like Watchmen and the chaplains who helped us on our prayer walk, and coordinating times that hopefully worked well with the other campus events” Sweitzer said.

As an active campus club, it is not without some concerns for engaging in more activities and outreach initiatives.

“Some of our short term goals are to get more regular yacht members as our goal for 2018 was to have 10 dedicated members, plus to keep five dedicated service learners even after their hours were fulfilled. We sincerely struggle with getting people to come once service learning is over” Sweitzer said.

Y.A.C.H.T demonstrates drive and motivation to assist in addressing homelessness, and Sweitzer gives a significant take away on the importance of directed action to which she expresses that: “Helping people is definitely something that I think the youth of this generation think is a good thing, but I don’t know how many actually do it. think in this age, it’s easy for someone to create a persona that they’re a nice, helpful person and they may even start to believe it. I think that everyone just thinks that someone else will do something, but no one takes an initiative themselves”. With the YACHT leaders and involved members, there is hope that more can be done but it is essential and vital that action is taken as a community together.

“We really do want to get the club more involved besides just giving out meals. It’s a good thing, but we have the resources to do so much more. We hope to get different programs to partner with us, like CCAS or the Career Center, since a lot of the people we meet could use help with mental health and with finding jobs. We want to be able to get our friends off the streets and into housing and secure work. We are interested in setting up programs or events that help them to create resumes and find jobs” Sweitzer said.

Among the various challenges that many homeless people face, we ask ourselves as the youth of our generation what can we possibly do in our position? Engaging with on-campus club ministries like Y.A.C.H.T that directly seek to positively impact underprivileged communities and facilitate initiatives for greater change is a certain method to do so. But most essential it is to be against complacency in systemic issues of homelessness that affect the most vulnerable of populations.

**Y.A.C.H.T outings and meetings are arranged Thursdays and Saturdays every semester and to participate, individuals should send an email to: yacht@eastern.edu **

Sources: National Coalition for the Homeless

Across Eastern, students attend classes, study long hours for tests, and repeat the whole process throughout the entire week. With what little time is left, students have to do chores, work, and clubs. With the increasing societal shift into concentrating on narrowly specific goals to succeed with little interdisciplinary overlap, the Society of Art and Illustration exhibits the opposite of that mindset. Set on giving the creative freedoms and reins to members to explore different artistic mediums, the art club allows students to intermingle and incorporate different influences from life into their work.

The Society of Art and Illustration headed by Senior President Emma Gerhartand Junior Vice-President Abigail Slater, provides a refreshing break from external stressors and a safe haven to work on art of all forms with freedom of expression.The club encourages people from all experience levels to come and participate in art.

“One of the best things about art club is that you do not have to consider yourself an artist to attend, people from anywhere between entry level through highly experienced attend.” said Gerhart

An attestation to the diverse interests of the art club can be found through the club’s own President and Vice President who connect their distinct academic disciplines to their art. For Abigail as a Communications major, she spends a lot of time learning how people communicate efficaciously and enjoys how “art expresses that communication of feelings”.

“Taking time to express myself through art gives me the time needed to reflect, process, and learn a little bit more about myself.” she said.

Gerhart, on the other hand, uses her major to also help guide her art.

“As a Psychology major, I have been able to see the importance of art more than ever. Art is truly a healer in so many ways. I find that it can help people express themselves in order to communicate with others. It can also give people a reason to take some much needed time off from the many other things they have on their plate. In the past, art club has had art therapy events with guest speakers who lead us through healing forms of art. I know this has been beneficial to Eastern students because they have expressed that it has taught them a new skill that assists them in coping with challenging circumstances related to their personal and academic lives.” Gerhart said.

Some of the positive values that the art club encourages is the way that art serves as a form of therapy to delve into new areas of creative pursuits such as watercolor, pastels, collaging,clay and everything in between and beyond. Although the club has many opportunities for the Eastern community, one hurdle has been letting the word spread through campus for more people to join.

“While Art Club has received a lot of support on Eastern’s campus from various people and organizations, the lack of a fine arts community has made it harder to get the word out about art club and its associated events” Slater said.

Despite the challenge of Eastern University lacking a Fine Arts program in the Visual Arts concentration, Gerhart and Slater have strove to make it an enriching experience as much as possible through collaborations with other campus clubs such as Habitat for Humanity, Step into Growth, and Inklings in past years. On top of very engaging collaborations, the club also has a fundraising event planned in the spring.

“We have done all nighters, art therapy events, birdhouse painting, and more. We plan to continue to this tradition and use our SGA funding to sponsor a fun night for Eastern students”. Said Gerhart.

With the prospect of many exciting and engaging projects in the works, the Society of Art and Illustration encourages individuals of all different majors and experiences to come in and do art. Meetings for the Society of Art and Illustration are held in the Gough Hall Great Room on Tuesdays from 7pm to 9pm weekly unless otherwise noted.