What Can I Do? - Getting Involved

What Can I do?

• Educate yourself about homelessness and poverty in your community.
• Contact a local shelter or advocacy group and find out what they need or how you can help. You can do something as an individual, a family, a school class or other group.
• Be kind to people you see on the street. It takes no effort to smile. See what 11-year - old Hannah Taylor, founder of the Ladybug Foundation says.
• Make a donation to a shelter or an advocacy group.
• November 22 is National Housing Day in Canada. Are there local events going on in your area that you can get involved with?
• Contact your local politicians and request a commitment to funding for affordable housing from all levels of government. People become homeless in many cases because they cannot pay the rent.
• Volunteer at a local shelter.
• Become an advocate.

Many advocacy sites have suggestions for getting involved - See links below:

• Cathy Crowe - a Toronto street nurse.
• Fred Victor Centre.
• The National Coalition for the Homeless in the USA.
• Out of the Cold.
• Raising the Roof.
• SKETCH working arts for street involved and homeless youth.
• Street Health.
• The Toronto Disaster Relief Committee.
• Toronto Homeless Memorial.
• The Wellesley Institute.

ADDITIONAL LINKS:

For teachers:

ETFO - Elementary Teacher’s Federation of Ontario – check out “Danny, King of the Basement” and related teaching materials.
Calgary School Board of Education: “Many Faces of Poverty and Homelessness” –resources for children and teachers.

Books For Adults:

Dying For a Home, Homeless Advocates Speak Out - Cathy Crowe, Between the Lines, 2007.
Homelessness. The Making and Unmaking of a Crisis - Jack Layton, Penguin, 2000.