My Groups Social Justice Project and the Elderly

With all these presentations starting and hearing about the work that other groups have done and the ideas people have had I have gotten this new sense of excitement. It is really cool and refreshing to see the things people come up with, have passions about and how they want to take things to the next level. Throughout this semester I have heard my professor, Professor G, tell our class multiple times that this class and the things we are learning aren't meant to stop here. She desires for our interests to be sparked and for us to be active and engaged in things. Continue to write Op-Eds, submit Op-Eds, volunteer, follow social justice issues and all the issues happening, do something about _________, I have enjoyed her encouragement and really hope that as we continue to grow as social workers we do these things. Social justice is not just a class. It is not just something you learn once and try to remember that one thing for some other class in the future. I am excited for what is to come.

As for my group and our social justice project, it has been interesting and a lot of fun for me. For over a year now I have had the opportunity to volunteer at Austin Groups for the Elderly, specifically the Elderhaven of Austin. This is a place where I have formed many friendships and bonds with not only the staff but many of the clients. The clients that come to Elderhaven are people who need some care during the day while their families, loved ones, caretakers or whoever can't be at home. For some reason or another they need an extra set of hands, eyes, ears, and some love. The clients at Elderhaven range in circumstance. Many have dementia or Alzheimer's, some have physical disabilities, others have other mental disabilities, among other stuff and some are fully able and just need some care during the day. One thing that has really stuck out to me is how much love and attention people desire and deserve. So often when I am there and sit down with someone or a small group of people and they start talking, they just want someone to listen to them. How I wish I could be that person for them all, but the reality is that I can't be, and never will be.

So when it came to social justice and population ideas these friends at Elderhaven and the elderly in general popped right into my mind. Tossing out the elderly as an idea happened, but I honestly did not expect for it to stick to be honest. I haven't found that much interest in the population within my fellow social work students. Not because they don't care, but there are so many interests people have. Somehow I was lucky enough to have my interest population have a group formed with it and off we went. Talking and brainstorming about the elderly and what specific issues were prevalent for them. My group members have been awesome and shared some great ideas. In the end though we settled with our idea and went with it. (I am going to leave you hanging, because I want to wait until we give our actual presentation next week... More to come later!)

One of the things we did that was especially fun for me was bringing my other group members to Elderhaven and having them meet many of the friends I have get to spend time with. It was fun to see them interacting and talking with them. While we did other project related stuff while we were there, them getting the opportunity to come and meet my Elderhaven friends meant a lot and I am glad they could do it! I am looking forward to sharing our project and for the class to know more about some of the people and people group that I care about so much!!

I want to share with you some personal pictures of some people near and dear to me, Here are some pictures of my grandparents. People that I love more than anything. They have taught me so much throughout my life. Even though some of them have passed away, I still feel and hear them talk to me very often. And this connection is one of the best feelings. I think that it is partially because of them and how much they have meant to me throughout my life that I have such an affinity for the elderly and older generations. I feel and think of wisdom, love, experience, stories, and strength when I think of my grandparents and the older generations.

My Nana and Papa taken when I was either very little or not born

My Grandy and I taken when I was in high school 

On a side note, people's projects have been awesome! Y'all are all so inspiring and hard workers. Great job class :)

I know I left a large part out of the blog about my exact project, but like I said that is all to come. So check back later my friends!

Thanks for reading and happy thoughts :)

Waste Land

This week I watched the Academy Award nominee documentary Waste Land. Going into watching this movie I was unaware of it's accolades until it showed several Sundance Film Festival awards as well as other film festival awards. Typically when I watch a documentary I go in skeptical because I have a tenancy to feel that they are over run with biases and not completely accurate information. So as this particular documentary started and saw the recognition it has earned, I changed my perception, but wanted to see what it was all about.

Waste land "follows renowned artist Vik Muniz as he journeys from his home base in Brooklyn to his native Brazil and the world's largest garbage dump, Jardim Gramacho, located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro" (Waste Land). The documentary invites you into the world of Jardim Gramacho and gives you a look into the lives of some of the workers who spend almost every waking hour there. You quickly learn that this community isn't a group of garbage pickers, but that they are people who are working to earn a living and who care about the "trash" at Jardim Gramacho. The documentary introduces you to one of the visionaries and creators a special group of people at the garbage dumb. To get a better understanding of the issues and problems this documentary is portraying I have included a clip from the documentaries website...
  
"In 1995, Rio’s sanitation department began to rehabilitate the landfill and formalise the job of the catador, granting licenses to catadores as well as enforcing basic safety standards, like the banning of children from the landfill. They also began a pilot project to create a carbon negative power plant fuelled by urban solid waste. On their side, the catadores formed ACAMJG, the Association of Recycling Pickers of Jardim Gramacho, whose president, Tião Santos, is featured in WASTE LAND. ACAMJG lead the way in community development. Under Tião’s leadership, ACAMJG has created a decentralized system of recycling collection in neighboring municipalities; the creation of a recycling center, professional recognition of the catador, enabling catadores to be contracted for their services, the creation of a 24 hour medical clinic, and the construction of a daycare center and skills training center. In addition to their community initiatives, ACAMJG leads a national movement for greater professional recognition for the catador and support from the federal government and has teamed up with other movements across South America to hold the first international conference of catadores in São Paulo in November 2009."    (Waste Land)
  
One of the first things I thought of while watching this video was India. In 2010, I had the opportunity to go to India with an organization called Truthseekers International. They are a "Christ-Centered reconciliation movement committed to spiritual and social freedom for India's oppressed" (Truthseekers). While I want to write on and on about the wonderful ministry of Truthseekers, I will stick to the point of this post ---> TRASH. While  in India, I was blown away by the amount of trash and garbage that was scattered everywhere! When preparing for my time in India, I thought and "prepared" about the differences of the nation I was going to (as best as I could). Trash and the actual physical state of the land that I was going did not ever enter my mind. Upon arriving I was shocked at how dirty the land was because of all the trash, waste, litter, garbage, or whatever you want to call it. I just kept thinking to myself about the trash, and would be sad that their beautiful nation was overcome by such an amount of trash. There is so much beauty all around, but it had a tendency of being overlooked because of trash.

What else would/should I have expected though? In a nation comprised of over a billion people, there will be a lot of trash. A billion people have a lot of waste. Especially in a country such as India, where they are not focused on issues like trash when the are concerned with having enough basic and other important needs like food, water, shelter, raising a family, having a job. Trash isn't on a level of priority for them. 
  
My point in bringing this up is that I don't think about trash very often. I am a recycler and I try to reduce the amount of trash I produce, but in the grand scheme of things I don't think about trash globally ever, if at all very often. This documentary was uplifting to watch because we were able to see what can happen when Tião and others have a dream and fight for their dream until it becomes true. They went against the critics who said this vision of theirs would never happen, they went against their friends and family who went against their ideas for their community development and fought for what they believed in and wanted for their community. They have made an impact in thousands of lives and have shed a light on issues such as waste, the importance of recycling, the lives and conditions of trash pickers, among many other things. 


Take a look at Waste Land's website to find more about the documentary and read about the art created out of "waste and trash". There is power in this film and the people who took the time to share their life experiences with us. 

Please look at the Waste Land and Truthseekers websites and learn more! 
Waste Land website
Truthseekers International website

One of my favorite quotes from the movie:
 "I'd rather want everything and have nothing, than have everything and want nothing. Because at least when you want something your life has a meaning: it's worthwhile. From the moment you think you have everything, you have to search for meaning in other things. I spent half my life wanting everything and having nothing; and now I have everything and I don't want anything. These days I'm starting to see things in a simpler way; I don't have as much material ambition as I used to. When I was poor I only wanted material things: I just wanted to have things. I had to buy a lot of crap to get rid of that complex."                                 - Vik Muniz


Thanks for reading! Happy thoughts :)

Understanding Ableism

I think that the word disability is said and thrown around often in our society without much thought to exactly what it means. I know that for me personally, it wasn't until a certain point in my life that I began to have an understanding what disability meant. For this post I am going to explain what disability and ableism mean.


The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) considers a person disabled if she or he has a significant impairment that interferes with a major life function, such as walking, seeing, hearing, learning, speaking, breathing, care of one's self, sitting, standing, or lifting. The ADA covers both physical and mental impairments, such as mental retardation, hearing impairments, visual impairments, speech or language impairments, emotional disabilities, orthopedic impairments, autism, traumatic brain injury, attention deficit disorders, learning disabilities, depression, mental illness (such as bipolar or schizophrenia), and chronic illnesses, such as diabetes, HIV/AIDS, cancer,epilepsy, multiple disabilities. (U.S. Dept. of Justice, 1999 and Castaneda, Hopkins, and Peters, 2010).


Think about that, that list includes a lot of people in America and worldwide. And to be honest, quite possibly could include you in some way, or someone very close to you. It is important to understand the broadness of the word disability and the vast amount of people it includes. An interesting statistic I read in my textbook was that "well over 74% of all Americans live with invisible disabilities" (The Invisible Disabilities Advocate, 1997). Other interesting stats I looked up were:

• Between 1990 and 2000, the number of Americans with disabilities increased 25 percent, outpacing any other subgroup of the U.S. population.
• Disability rates vary geographically, as well (source: U.S. Census 2000):
• Nearly 40 percent of persons reporting a disability live in the South - twice the 20 percent of each of the other three geographic areas. Persons living in Alaska, Utah and Minnesota each reported the lowest rates of disability, about 15 percent. Persons living in West Virginia reported the highest rate of disability, at 24.4 percent, followed by Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky and Mississippi, each over 23 percent.
• Of the 49.7 million non-institutionalized individuals aged five and older who reported having a disability in the U.S. 2000 Census (source: U.S. Census 2000)
• 9.3 million reported having a sensory disability involving sight or hearing.
• 21.2 million reported having a disability that limits their ability to engage in basic physical activity such as walking, climbing stairs, reaching, lifting or carrying.
• 12.4 million reported having a physical, mental or emotional condition that makes it difficult to learn, remember or concentrate.
• 6.8 million reported a physical, mental or emotional condition that makes it difficult to dress, bathe or get around inside the home.
• 18.2 million reported their disability makes it difficult to venture outside the home.

• Noninstitutionalized adults 18 years and older (source: CDC website)

  • Number of adults with hearing trouble: 37.1 million
  • Percent of adults with hearing trouble: 16.2%
  • Number of adults with vision trouble: 21.5 million
  • Percent of adults with vision trouble: 9.4%
  • Number of adults unable (or very difficult) to walk a quarter mile: 16.7 million
  • Percent of adults unable (or very difficult) to walk a quarter mile: 7.3%
  • Number of adults with any physical functioning difficulty: 35.8 million
  • Percent of adults with any physical functioning difficulty:  15.6%

As you can see, this word disability includes a lot of people. More people than I ever realized that's for sure!
I was fortunate to have been exposed to some of the most sweet and caring people I have ever met from a very young age of about 5. These people I am referring to are all people with disabilities, and most of them are severe. My aunt has worked at a place called Midwest Special Services in St. Paul, Minnesota for 40 years. This is a place where the clients range in disability from down syndrome, cerebral palsy, autism, visually impaired, hearing impaired, as well as senior adults with disabilities. I would go and visit my aunt with my brother and spend time with the clients. To be honest, the first couple of years that I went, I would be uncomfortable and some of the clients particularly made me scared. They had unpredictable movements and would often times scream, and have more spastic movements which is something that as a 5 year old I had never experienced before. I would play very simple games with them, color, play with the ladies hair, and do a variety of activities. I grew to have personal relationships with several of the clients and looked forward to going back to visit. As time as gone on, many of the original clients that I met have passed away or moved permanently into a group home. But, every time I go up to Minnesota to see family I always make a stop at Midwest. There is something about seeing these precious clients and getting to spend just a short while with them that brings me joy and puts my own life into a different perspective.

In the summer of 2008, my church went on a mission trip Empire, Colorado to the Rocky Mountain Village Easter Seals Camp. Let me tell you, that was one of the most exhausting and memorable summers I have ever had!!! I often find myself remembering my time there and day dreaming about it. For the trip we were able to be camp counselors along side the residential summer counselors and got to work with kids from the age of around 16 and younger. We were assigned cabins and spent all day with our campers doing a range of awesome activities and adventures like swimming, fishing, overnight camping, outdoor cooking, travel camp, day trips, arts & crafts, sports and recreation, hiking, dances, music & drama, horse-back riding, and riding the zip-line. I would help with things like feeding the campers, changing them, spend quite time with them, give piggy back rides, and do anything and everything that they want to do. I had some of the kids tell me that they lived for the sole experience of coming to this camp. And when I say live, I literally mean LIVE for this camp. They spend a majority of their lives not being accepted for who they are, not having friends, and live being extremely limited by the things they are not able to do. This summer experience at Easter Seals was life changing, and I forever think about going back and being a counselor. Those kids and campers are some of the most fearless, boldest, happy, energetic kids I have had the opportunity to meet and I love them so much. 

Please take a look at this video and see a glimpse of what I was lucky enough to experience. 

I encourage you, to think about your interpretation of disabled and the people in your life who have a disability. I hope you love and respect them no less than you do someone who is fully able. 

Thanks for reading! Happy thoughts :)