Hooray! The group is back from New Orleans and ready to rock College Park with details of the trip. Expect a few more posts from both trip leaders, including this one:

For someone who usually over-prepares for surprises, I was startled many times over this past week in (super beautiful and filled with AWESOME gumbo!!!) NOLA.

For many reasons, I expected to gain the most from the educational experiences I had set up with Emily and with the New Orleans community. While I think I’m really excited to share my new found understanding of T-Walls and flood damage with everyone I know, I found something even more special and striking on the trip.

I met a very special kid on my first day volunteering at Head Start. I’m going to go ahead and call him Ron. Over the course of 4 days I got very attached to this 3-year old kid. I still see him in my head all day: He has long eyelashes, brown (really sad) eyes, and a big smile I rarely ever got to see. He spent every recess sitting under the jungle gym, and by the end of the week I had gotten used to coaxing him out from under it. He never would; instead he’d collapse onto my legs or start crying. He cried almost every day. These crying fits would never be provoked—he’d sometimes wake up from naptime crying.

Finally, I took a risk on the last day and decided to ask his teacher what the problem was. She told me that Ron lived with his grandmother ever since he witnessed his mother being killed by his father. I asked what sort of resources there were for kids like Ron. She said that after Katrina, there were none.

I ended up not being able to say goodbye to Ron (it’s just as well, I would have tried to tuck him in my backpack and take him with me back to College Park), but I don’t think I’ll have many days from now on where I don’t think about the misery I knew he and so many other kids at that center feel. I have no idea what could happen to him.

Luckily for me, I have the reassurance that someone will be there to care for him during schooltime, but what about at home? And what happens after he goes to public school, where class sizes only get larger? Kids studying in New Orleans Parish (a parish is similar to a county) right now aren’t guaranteed the same attention or relief that students are in, say, Montgomery or Howard County, or even in neighboring parishes similar to NOLA. I can’t help but wonder why not, especially after meeting a remarkable kid like Ron, who is already struggling at age 3.

I can’t say that I gave Ron or any of the other BRILLIANT students at MLK Head Start as much as they gave me. But a little attention and concern might go a long way.

- vanessa, 1/2 of the TLs (thanks, awesome participants + awesome staff advisor, see you at post-trip! you’re the greatest nuggets in the world.)

Over the past week, our band of girls (and boys) gone wild for community service has roamed the streets of New Orleans, making friends as we volunteered at Head Start programs. We thought it was clear at the start of our service that the kids simply needed attention and positive reinforcement. However, as our service progressed and relationships were formed, we found ourselves questioning the impact of our actions. Were we building a long lasting positive impact or creating only short term success that would eventually lead to greater losses?

By Tuesday of our week long venture, team members began to raise concerns as to whether our service was creating trust issues with the children. We took a genuine interest in our students and even formed emotional attachments, but we would be gone after a week. Many groups before us had done the same and children still recited their names. Were these 3-5 year-old children lacking stability, and would this lead to trust issues in their lives? Not only could we be detrimental to the children’s development, but we would leave behind no tangible contributions to the community unlike our fellow St. Jude residents focusing their efforts on rebuilding homes.

Kids do not rely on volunteer service in their childhood development. Instead, children depend on primary caregivers such as mothers and fathers. A parent’s absence in a child’s life is constantly reinforced. When other children’s parents attend school functions and their parents do not, the child is reminded of his misfortune. However, a child is not constantly reminded of a former volunteer’s absence. A child does not harbor ill feelings toward his brief relationships, he takes with him only the extra development formed by the additional interaction he would not have received otherwise.

Though, as we finished our final day at the Head Start programs, issues still lingered in the back of our minds. As we exited through the lobby on Friday afternoon, a faculty member stopped to thank us for our assistance.  We had not worked with this particular woman, yet she took the time to mention that she watched us playing with the kids and how much they enjoyed our efforts to engage with them. She told us that our “volunteering meant more to the community than we could know.” As a teacher who works with the kids daily, she would know better than us of our long-term impacts on the children. She would see the kids attitudes change with the coming and going of volunteers. However, she left us only with a genuine expression of gratitude. We walked out of the school on our final day reassured that the results of our efforts coincided with our intentions.

- Derek and Danielle O.

Initially, I was skeptical and worried that our efforts weren’t related to Hurricane Katrina and that our aid wasn’t really needed. I didn’t want to voice my concerns, but thankfully I was proven wrong by our reflection times, wonderful guest speakers, and through first hand observation. The program we’re working with is called ‘Katrina’s Kids’ and this is rightly so—the cute little children we’re working with were born right around the time of the hurricane. Though they didn’t witness first-hand the effects of Katrina, the children see the impact of the disaster in almost every aspect of their lives. There are no playgrounds available for children in the Ninth Ward to spend their time in. Construction is evident in almost every street of their neighborhoods. We were told that some parents even use Katrina as an excuse for their lack of involvement in their children’s lives.

Through our service, we are proving to the children, their families, the program’s staff, and the community that there are still people who care. We recognize that the children may be coming from homes that don’t have ideal conditions. We are told that the neighborhoods they live in are dangerous and that the children are accustomed to news of shootings and drive-bys. By being here and volunteering our time at their head start programs, we’re showing that we want to improve their living conditions. I believe that that simple display of compassion is enough to make a difference, no matter how big or small, in their lives.

- nari lee

Blog:

Throughout the week our group has been interacting with children from three different schools. We have all shared our experiences with each other and have come to many similar conclusions; these children simply have not had the opportunity to experience the childhood that they all deserve. It is my opinion that all children are entitled to a loving family, an ample environment for creative learning, and a safe environment to play and have fun. Without these things children are susceptible to falling to the temptations of the “street life.” Now since I believe this in general, when critiquing an environment such as New Orleans which has had a catastrophic change to its society, I believe these kids to be more delicate and distracted from a “normal child’s” priorities.

        When people suffer any changes in general, people go through a certain amount of an adjustment period. This adjustment period can bring about a great deal of negative emotions. Now imagine that the change that you had to deal with was a hurricane that wiped out your city, your family, your friends, your favorite stores, your places of worship, and even your homes. This traumatic experience calls for an adjustsment period in the form of mourning. Now, people have two ways to deal with their transgressions, they can one: use their trauma as a vessel to display their strengths and realize the importance life and its transient nature or two: take to the form of a helpless human being losing interest in moral values and moving on with life ( These two actually fall on a spectrum, representing opposite end poles, because i’m sure there is a middle point). I think that the parents of the children we are working with were dealing with harsh times before Katrina and the hurricane added insult to injury. I feel like the majority of these parents were already struggling with poverty and the hurricane just kicked them while they were down, which sadly brought out the worst in them.

      The children we are working with have been exposed to adult issues that young children at the ages of 2-5 years old should not be dealing with. The fact that they are dealing with such heavy issues such as gangs, guns, violence, jail, and especially non active parenting at such an early age, these kids futures are sadly in jeopardy. The solution in my opinion is to first change the attitudes and priorities of the parents. This can potentially result in a greater awareness of the environments that children are being allowed to be exposed to. Then I would imagine the next progressive step of action could simply be better parenting. It is of course easier said than done, but for the sake of the future of these children it seems essential that something be done create a more active envornment between parents and their children. 

      So when asked did Hurricane Katrina affect these children I would say yes. I would also say that the negative indirect effect of Katrina can and hopefully will one day be forgotten for the sake of ameliorating the environment for the children we have met.  ( I wanted to write more , but im exhausted!)

Dan Shenouda

This is the front page of the first print edition of the Times-Picayune released in New Orleans post Katrina, only 3 days later.  It was distributed to the evacuees who had been taking refuge in the Convention Center by Sports Editor of the paper, David Meeks.  I (Emily G) work in a job that requires me to contact newspaper staffers and verify their positions.  All of the people at this newspaper who risked their lives to provide coverage of Katrina are still there 6 years later. They continue to inform and fight for the citizens in the city that are determined to restore.

The journalist whose names are attached to each of these stories made a decision to stay behind when they were urged to evacuate.  They slept in sleeping bags and on air mattresses in a small, blistering hot room called the “Hurricane Bunker.” “The newspaper staffers and staffers from affiliated web site “nola.com” posted continual updates on the internet up until the time the building was evacuated on August 30.”  They did this to keep the citizens of their city from feeling blind to the status of the homes they left behind.

When we first walked in the Louisiana State Museum, the first thing that strikes you are hundreds of glass bottles with messages in them hanging from the ceiling. The bottles symbolize Katrina victims’ hope of trying to reconnect their families. This exhibit, like ones to follow, aim at putting visitors in the shoes of those who suffered through Katrina.

The following displays guided through hurricane and the aftermath of aid, or lack thereof. The museum had a very realistic feel aesthetically through visuals and movies. One particular exhibit that stood out was a room with three large screens displaying real footage of flooding and damage during Katrina. Water trickled in the background of the room and sounds of whirling winds and gushing water gave the impression of how it would feel to experience this tragedy.

The overwhelming takeaway of the museum was the resilience of the people of New Orleans that were able to overcome such devastation. However, after seeing the Lower Ninth Ward, we realized that the destruction of the storm still ensues and many people have not fully recovered.

Professor Nelson took us to an area where even six years after the storm had hit, only several houses have survived and few have been rebuilt. The staggered reconstructed homes were modernly designed but in no way replaced the community that once existed in the area.

The complete elimination of this community can be attributed to carelessness of mankind. The flood walls that implemented failed because government engineers recognized they constructed the flood walls too short but failed to correct their mistakes. In addition, lack of funding and interest led to poorly designed levee and flood wall architecture. Instead of clay, a sturdy component, organic material, sand, and even shells were used as unsturdy substitutes. We conclude that this natural disaster was exacerbated by both the lack of preventative measures and relief procedures. We hope that in the future people look long term benefits even though the gain might not be immediate.

Our group and the other groups staying at St. Jude with Mac, a survivor of Katrina who lived in the lower ninth ward community when the storm hit in 2005.  He spoke to us about his experience and about his organization: “Lower Ninth Ward Village” (Google it!).

Taken at our visit to the Lower Ninth Ward today.  The night before seeing this part of NOLA night Amanda told us to “look at the grass because any grass you see is where a house once stood.”

This might be the best one yet. Wednesday quote!