Assembly to Cap Homeless Project Reveals In-School Insensitivity to It

An Irvine High School assembly meant to raise sensitivity toward homelessness took a surprise turn Monday when some students told their peers that they feel excluded for having less money than others.

The assembly followed a three-day exercise last week in which 125 of the school’s students practiced self-deprivation in an attempt to learn more about homelessness. The assembly had been intended as a crowning moment for the project, in which those students would share with the school at large what they had learned and introduce homeless people to tell their own stories.

But then junior Crystal Davis told thousands of her peers that she lives with her family in subsidized housing and often feels left out because she cannot afford expensive clothes or electronic accessories. Conversations and activities revolve around having money, she said; it’s a culture that makes those without money feel they must keep it to themselves.

Over the weekend, Crystal decided that it was time to tell her well-heeled classmates how their callous attitudes toward poor people affect her. “Some of you guys are superficial,” Crystal said. “I experienced so much coming to this new school from Anaheim.”

Crystal was not the only student who came forward and confessed that she had been hiding her family’s poverty in order to fit in. Cortney Cross, a senior, revealed that she had been homeless for eight months her freshman year and had frantically mixed and matched outfits so no one would notice she had so few clothes. Another student stood up and said her family had gone through periods when they were unable to afford food.

The revelations took teachers by surprise. They had hoped that the weeklong project in hunger and homelessness--which included not changing clothes, forgoing TV and cell phones and sleeping one night in the family car--would alter students’ attitudes toward the poor.

But they had no idea that the assembly to talk about the project would open up economic fissures among the student body, where issues of class and poverty are usually so carefully ignored that students refer to their world as “the bubble.”

‘I’m Thinking About How Selfish I’ve Been’

“I am hoping this will affect the school climate,” said Terry Griffin, the soft-spoken history teacher who helped facilitate the awareness project. “I hope this will make our students more aware of differences, and feel like differences are OK.”

But some students said they do not have faith that attitudes will change much on a campus where many teens refused to go even one day without showering for the homelessness project, and others mocked those who chose to do so.

“The biggest thing I learned was there are so many people who keep their minds closed,” junior Shaista Valle told fellow students at the assembly. “I just wish there was a way to get through to people. One of the most shocking things I found out was how quick we are to turn our backs.”

But Cortney, the senior who spoke about her time in a homeless shelter, said she felt comforted by the warmth and understanding her classmates showed her once she revealed the secret she’d kept for three years.

Other participants emotionally confessed that their attitudes toward the homeless had changed.

“I’m thinking about how selfish I’ve been,” said freshman Shree Khalid, who sat on the gym floor during assembly and listened with rapt attention to her classmates’ stories. “I always used to think if I don’t get a new CD player, I’m deprived. But when you hear about this, I think I should start being grateful for what I have.”

Many of the homeless and formerly homeless people who came to the assembly praised the students for their attempts at understanding, and urged them to keep their minds and hearts open.

“You guys are really lucky just to have a place to go home to,” said a formerly homeless woman who asked to be identified as Ana. “My hopes for you guys today is that you can recognize this.”