Sara is 23 years old and seven months pregnant. She is expecting her fourth child and has been on the street for two years. She has worked several labor pool jobs and has done some writing.
Finding a job has been her biggest obstacle thus far. She approached many places in Fort Lauderdale but finds there is little interest in hiring her. Once her child is born, a friend will take temporary custody so she can get back on her feet. In five years, she hopes to have a stable job and have her own house or apartment … A word of advice she has for everyone is, “Stay where you are, don’t lose anything, because in a blink of an eye, you could lose everything.”
The October issue of “Homeless Voice,” the nation’s second-largest homeless newspaper, features articles and photographs by 24 college students from across the nation. Three of the students — Adrienne Cutway, Laura Newberry and Ashley Sikand – are UCF journalism majors. Sikand wrote the vignette at the top of this story.
The students, aided by several advisers, spent the Labor Day weekend creating an entire issue of the newspaper from scratch. They spoke to residents of a Hollywood, Fla., homeless shelter about topics such as food, drugs, tattoos and love, and they turned what they learned into news articles. They also shot photos and designed the layout of the 20-page newspaper.
In its third year, the program Will Write For Food places student journalists within homeless communities of South Florida as they produce “Homeless Voice.” The program is run by the South Florida branch of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Click here to read the issue.