Monday 9 August through to Thursday 13 August was Padua College Rosebud Campus Homelessness Awareness Week. It gave us a chance to learn how we can support people in our community and understand some of the challenges that people experiencing homelessness face.
On Monday, we heard from Jacqueline from Fusion Mt Martha, where she shared stories that helped us understand how quickly someone’s life can change and how important support networks are. Fusion provides accommodation and advocacy, as well as life skills for young people and families experiencing or at risk of homelessness. To show how little some people have to eat, the canteen only offered half a cup of rice on Monday, and we managed to sell 76 half cups across the two breaks.
Tuesday, the lockers were closed, and students had to carry all their belongings around for the day. This was done so we could understand what it’s like not to have a permanent place to store your belongings, and how people experiencing homelessness often have to carry everything they own with them. In addition to this, we had a specialised Excel lesson during period two including trivia along with clips and articles that guided us through homelessness statistics and helped us understand the issues affecting people in our local community.
On Wednesday, the textiles room was open during lunch break for people to sew neck socks and hats to be donated to those in need. On Thursday, students helped create a collage of photos they had taken for the “Shine a Light on Homelessness” campaign, a community awareness campaign where the public were invited to collect a green light bulb from the Mornington Peninsula Shire to install at home to highlight housing insecurity and financial distress in our community.
Thank you to everyone who participated in this week's events and to all who helped to plan and take action. We hope you learned something about homelessness, especially since it’s a real issue in our community with some of the highest numbers in Victoria sleeping rough, so moving forward we can continue to take action and spread awareness on this issue.
