On November 21st after the dining hall’s Thanksgiving dinner the Sleep-Out held in honor of November’s National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Month was fully set up. Students headed out of the dining hall to participate in the first event, SGA’s Campus Scavenger Hunt.

“The main purpose and goal of this event is to bring awareness to homelessness; students will have the opportunity to sleep outside and experience what the night is like for someone without a home,” said Elaheh Eghbal, the AmeriCorps VISTA coordinator in the Career Center.

Referring to the turnout, Cassidy Rucker, head of the Hood Habitat for Humanity Club, said that it was “really good actually, about 5-10 people slept out and if I had to guess at least 20 people came out for the scavenger hunt and activities, so I thought that it was a good turn out.”

At the start of the scavenger hunt SGA member Katie Bailey handed out the clues on brightly colored index cards. Bailey explained that each clue would lead to a different spot on campus where a SGA member asks the students a question related to poverty or homelessness statistics.

One such question was: “True or False? More than 20 million US children rely on school meal programs to keep from going hungry”- which turned out to be true. Upon correctly answering the question the students were given the index card, which had the next location. The premise was that the team who collected all 10 index cards and made it back to the tent first were the winners. Half an hour later the first team returned, winning gifts cards, and 45 minutes later all the teams were done after collecting all 10 clues.

Eghbal said that, “if they choose to, students can participate in the evening events but not sleep outside.”

Participants in the night’s events signed in with their name, email address, graduation year, and intent to sleep on the quad. Even though not everyone who came over to get some food or hot chocolate signed in a total of 30 participants wrote down their names.

On the sign-in sheet eight people said that they would sleep out on the quad, one person put down a maybe, and another person wrote in the box “its freezing!”At midnight the temperature was 45 degrees Fahrenheit. According to WeatherSpark the average low for this time of year is 23 degrees, though 43 degrees is still rather cold compared to the ‘room temperature’ of around 70 degrees that many people are used to.

“I’m wearing four pairs of pants,” said Bailey, the SGA member who had handed out the initial clue cards to the students for the scavenger hunt.

After the scavenger hunt students dug through the trash for bags of chips, crackers, cookies, and candy in a simulation to actually needing to dig through the trash to find something to eat. The food was provided by the Career Center and Hood’s Habitat for Humanity Club. Hot chocolate was also available as most of the students settled down on tarps on the grass to play card games and some others played Frisbee. There was music playing as some of the students decorated a banner, which prompted, “What words would you use to describe poverty?” Words like, “tragedy”, “ignored”, and “disheartening” were used.

According to the Dean of the Chapel Beth O’Malley, the Chapel has “been participating in the National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week's community dinner and prayer vigil for six years and began supporting the Sleep-Out last year when Monique Sledd, Hood's Vista volunteer, proposed the idea.”

“Campus Safety is aware of the event so it allows us to engage in hands-on learning in a safe environment,” Eghbal said.

Catherine Brown, the Grad Student assistant to Dean O’Malley was one of the co-chaperones of the evening. Brown said that there would be a fire to make s’mores, but later Eghbal announced that Don Miller, the Director of Student Activities and Orientation prohibited setting a campfire on the quad. Eghbal suggested that students could go to one of the dorm kitchens to make the s’mores if they wanted.

Rucker, who had helped to “recruit people to come to the event through the Habitat for Humanity club, so a lot of Habitat club members came to support the event,” said that, “more people [passersby] would be coming over if there was a fire.”

“This is the second year of the Sleep Out; hopefully it will continue for many more years,” said Eghbal.

Meg Rose, a Hood College Senior who attended the event until about midnight, said that she “went to hang out […] to help raise awareness” and that her “favorite part [was] hanging out and playing cards.”

            For more information visit the AmeriCorps VISTA website.