Kianna is 17 years old. She suspects that she has depression. She only recently started experiencing symptoms of her mental illness, so she’s having a hard time adjusting. To complicate her situation, she’s homeless along with the rest of her family. Her parents lost their jobs in January and could no longer afford rent. They ended up having to move from shelter to shelter. Continue reading
Written by Perry Firth, project coordinator, Seattle University’s Project on Family Homelessness and school psychology graduate student
Caption: This image captures just how many people attended WLIHA’s Conference on Ending Homelessness. As you can see, we were a big crowd! Image from WLIHA.
This year I had the pleasure of attending the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance’s Conference on Ending Homelessness in Tacoma, May 13-14. I was there with over 800 people (the largest turnout yet), all devoted to making homelessness rare, brief and one time.
There were many highlights, including Firesteel’s presentation on StoryCorps and strategic communications, the Project on Family Homelessness’s “Dessert Dash” and StoryCorps workshop, and the sessions on host homes for homeless youth and trauma-informed care.
Firesteel shows how StoryCorps can be a valuable communication tool
I loved Firesteel’s presentation on StoryCorps and strategic communications. As part of the Project on Family Homelessness, I have had the honor of helping the StoryCorps effort reach its full potential. As the Firesteel team and Joaquin of WLIHA discussed StoryCorps’ many uses and the role of strategic communications in ending homelessness, I was reminded of how many lives this project has touched.
This was further emphasized to me when our own team hosted a workshop and “Dessert Dash” with Sherry and Franklin Gilliard—a family whose courage in the face of home loss and homelessness was profiled on NPR’s Friday StoryCorps segment this past November. Continue reading
Written by Perry Firth, project coordinator, Seattle University’s Project on Family Homelessness and school psychology graduate student
Editor’s Note: This is a re-post from our partners at Firesteel.
Caption: Here is a portion of our new infographic, “The Big Brain.” If you want to see the rest of the infographic, keep reading! Image from the Project on Family Homelessness.
In September, Seattle University students Perry Firth and Krista Kent created nine new infographics as part of our series, Poverty and Homelessness in the Public School System. The experience inspired them to create one super-infographic that they nicknamed “The Big Brain.” It took them three months. What are the perils of encapsulating so much information into one bold visualization? Perry takes us behind the scenes of creating this brand-new infographic, “Child Homelessness & Toxic Stress: Far-Reaching Consequences,” and shares some pointers for designers and writers who take on the challenges of conveying complex data.
I once read somewhere that we have the attention span of goldfish.
Or, at least I think that’s what I read. I was scanning the article, so I could be wrong.
Jokes aside, there is no doubt that the Internet is shaping how information is conveyed, and interacted with. People are reading less. Yes, it’s true. And, in our Internet-saturated culture, our attention spans are also decreasing.
We start articles, but we don’t always finish them.
Where once people were more interested in in-depth analysis of a particular subject matter, now we scan contently quickly, picking out choice pieces of information.
This is something that the Project on Family Homelessness team is aware of. Therefore we have increasingly prioritized developing high-quality infographics (visual representations of information) – either on behalf of our partner organizations or for our own content – as a way to convey our messaging without overwhelming our audience.
And no, the irony is not lost on me that I am writing something that requires reading, about how people aren’t reading. Ha!
Caption: Hi! My name is Perry. I enjoy writing long pieces around the need to write less. Photo courtesy of Perry Firth. Continue reading
We’ve just said some sad good-byes to most of our team members on the Project on Family Homelessness, but we welcome several great additions to our team. Here’s who will be impressing you in the months to come, and a reflection on some of the outstanding work of our former team members.
New Project Assistants: Krista Kent and Emma Lytle
Krista Kent is a senior in the Digital Design program, minoring in Spanish. She’ll be our new design assistant, taking over for McKenna Haley (see below).
Krista comes to us with a strong background in design and active involvement in the community. Since winter of 2012, Krista has worked with Seattle University’s Center for Service and Community Engagement. She created flyers and informational design for the Center, and has worked at Bailey-Gatzert Elementary assisting teachers in classrooms and helping first graders in an afterschool-tutoring program. Recently Krista had the opportunity to re-brand First Cup Coffee House into Mama’s Café, as part of the 23rd and Union Small Business Consultation and Community Enhancement Project.
Emma Lytle is our new project assistant, replacing Tiana Quitugua, who just graduated (see below).
Emma is entering her senior year as a strategic communications major at Seattle University. She joins us with a passion for working with non-profits and with children. She recently finished a seven-month internship with the Make-A-Wish Foundation, where she handled sensitive communication with families and healthcare professionals. Emma also worked for several years as a daycare teacher and loves working with children and families. Some of our partners might remember Emma from her enthusiastic volunteer work and professionalism at the Hack to End Homelessness and the SIFF American Refugees premiere. She’s busy working on outreach for the StoryCorps project.
New Grad Assistant/Project Coordinator: Perry Firth
We’re happy to welcome back Perry Firth, in an expanded role as half-time Project Coordinator, taking over for Graham Pruss (see below).
Perry is continuing her graduate work at Seattle U in school psychology and spent the past school year as a research assistant to a visiting scholar and counseling psychologist. Their work together focused on prevention and wellness, ecological counseling, and toward the end of their time together, school shootings. That position ended just as we needed to fill our position — lucky us! Perry is committed to approaching mental health issues through a social justice lens, and has a special interest in anxiety disorders, adolescence, and issues that disproportionately impact women. She is a gifted writer who is especially adept at analyzing the intersection between academic research and its applications to family homelessness, just as she did in these Firesteel posts on Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and the all-time most-viewed Firesteel post, on dehumanization, “Why We Keep Walking.” We’ll be looking for her to help us understand more about the important links between housing and academic achievement for children in our state.
projectonfamilyhomelessness.org 