Day 3: Wednesday

Longest Day of My LIFE:

Here is a glimpse of what my schedule looks like today...safe to say I'm barely going to find enough time to eat let alone blog. As of now it looks like I'll be recapping my day after A Cappella ends at 10:30..but until then, wish me luck!

8:00am: Wake up 

9:00 - 10:15: Marketing

10:30 - 11:45: Critical Thinking and Analysis

12:00 - 1:15: Macroeconomics

1:30: Read case study and eat lunch

3:00 - 4:45: Entrepreneurship and Innovation

5:00 - 7:00: Poverty Simulation

7:00 - 8:00: Initiation Practice for Kappa Alpha Theta

8:30 - 1030: A Cappella Practice
10:30 - Homework

Hello again. Its currently 11pm, I'm sitting in my bed, and I have boycotted doing homework for the rest of the night, I can barely keep my eyes open. Today was one of, if not the busiest day I have ever had at Richmond. My schedule today required a significant amount of caffeine and different foods that would keep me energized throughout the day. Unfortunately, I did not have either of those things.

When I woke up in the morning, I made myself a small portion of oatmeal with some banana and ate it on the way to my Marketing class. I was feeling pretty satisfied throughout the morning, but within the first 10 minutes of my 12:00 Macroeconomics class, my stomach started to gurgle angrily. I thought this was interesting because I don't start to feel hungry at all until the last 15 minutes or so of class. Although my stomach felt relatively full throughout the morning, I was really tired and lethargic in all of my classes, and even though I had a decent sleep last night, I still felt so out of it.

Poverty Simulation:

As you can see in the schedule above, I participated in a poverty simulation with my Justice class from 5:00-7:00pm today. When I arrived at the simulation, the directors gave me a packet of information, told me my name was Stella Smith, and that I should go find my "family" and sit with them. When I finally found my area, it was just a single chair with the name "Smith" on the back. I was surprised and a little confused, so I looked through my packet of information and realized that my character, Stella, was an 85 year old woman who lived in a homeless shelter. As the program coordinators explained how the simulation was going to work, I started to get a little nervous as I looked around at all the families planning how they were going to earn/spend their money wisely. I had no one to talk to, and no one to rely on. Throughout the duration simulation, I was required to try to find housing, pay my utilities bill, buy enough food for the month, pay for my arthritis medicine and pay money to the bank as a pre-funeral deposit. I found that one of the most challenging aspects was how frustrating it was to pay for transportation to the bank, wait in line for several minutes and then just as you were about to pay, the directors of the simulation would tell you to return to your "home" because it was the end of the week. Then, at the beginning of the next week, you had to pay for transportation again and hope that you would finally be helped in time. I thought that being alone in the simulation had its benefits because the only person I had to take care of was myself, but this was a scary thought at the same time. For example, at one point I was waiting in line to pay for food when I realized that food didn't cost $30 for the whole month, it cost $30 per week. For a second, I completely forgot that I was in a simulation. My stomach lurched as I dug through my bag of monopoly money and saw that I wouldn't have enough money to pay for food. In a panic, I looked through the rest of my packet and noticed that I had jewelry that I could sell at the pawn shop to earn extra money and I was able to relax a little.

That's when I understood how real this simulation actually was. Poverty is not a game. Poverty is not something that you can fix by selling a piece of jewelry to earn a little extra cash. There are millions of people who feel the same panic I felt when they realize they don't know how they are going to afford their next meal. I used to think that poverty was something that you could just overcome. I thought it was something you could get out of if you worked hard enough. Now I realize how ignorant I was. No matter how hard I worked, I was only able to experience short term relief, and perpetual frustration.

Really, Richmond?

At the end of the simulation, the directors thanked us for being so engaged and proceeded to encourage us to grab one of the many snacks in the back of the room before we broke up for small group discussions. As I looked around the room, every single student taking a Justice class looked either shocked or confused. After completing an entire simulation about what it is like to live in poverty, we were encouraged to go eat food that we not only didn't need, but also food we weren't technically allowed to eat?? Did the University not realize that after the simulation, half of the students were probably going to walk down the hill and go fill up their plates at Dhall, except for those on the SNAP Challenge? Don't get me wrong..I absolutely love this school, and I am so lucky to be here, but REALLY? After spending 2 hours of our day educating us about the poverty that occurs in the city of Richmond itself, I was shocked that University thinks its acceptable to spend an unnecessary amount of money on food that we of all people do. not. need.