Vulnerable People and Places Blog

    Often when we are talking about vulnerable people and places, it is on the topic of political campaigns and reform. We have seen many a politician on the campaign trail stand up and talk about the poor and how he/she can push through political reform to help these people and provide programs for them to get out of poverty. Yet there is little that has really moved the needle in addressing the stagnant wages as well as overall poverty in the U.S. and I believe this is largely due to partisan politics as well as corporate control of our government. Often we get caught up in the media hype of this party is at fault and we play the blue and red blame game until our eyes bleed. I would argue that neither blue nor red party has the interests of the people at mind and our not looking to reduce overall poverty. This is largely due to the fact of special and corporate interests controlling our politicians as well as our country. If you look at the amount of campaign dona...

Often in today’s times it is easy to get caught up in the negativity and sadness of vulnerable people and populations. This often emotes certain emotions in the brain and in my mind leads to creativity. I wrote this song originally to be put in the video, but things didn’t really work out as planned and it seemed a waste to not post it. When things get me down, I often move to music or some other creative outlet to cope with the surrounding negativity in my life. I hope viewers of this blog can take the negativity that is in our world and turn it into something special. Whether that is volunteering for a worthy cause or creating something that has never been heard before.    Song

    Often when we talk about vulnerable population in their need for food, very rarely is the topic discussed on what type of food they are getting and how it affects their health. Many of the food available to these populations are genetically modified and are laced with round up and other chemicals that have taken over the modern food industry. Direct genetic modification of products is focused most heavily on cash crops such as corn and soy. Although this process is primarily focused on just a few products, the effect is huge in that these types of crops are the foundational basis for nearly all processed foods that American’s consume daily. It is currently estimated that a staggering 88% of corn and 93% of soy crops are genetically modified. Derivatives from these products go under hundreds of names such as high fructose corn syrup, soy lecithin, hydrogenated oils, tocopheral, protein, and many others that are commonly found on any package in a supermarket or gr...

    Although it is easy to tell people that helping the meals on wheels movement is important it is also relevant to uphold what volunteering can really do for people’s day to day lives.   Here are the top five reasons why you should volunteer for the meals on wheels or some other project. 1.        Improves self-esteem – Often we look at such things as volunteering as benefiting the end user, but often is quite the opposite. Often the person volunteering gets much more out of the overall experience than the end user. Volunteering has been linked to building self-esteem, and delivering one of the most basic items to those in need is a sure fire way to have a major boost on your overall personal self-confidence. 2.        Builds Community Often in today’s world we look at the community around us and it seems all but lost in the wake of social media and our self-serve soc...

It is a frightening fact that more than millions of Americans have been affected by the nation’s economic crisis. In 2015, 43.1 million Americans lived in poverty, according to U.S. Census Bureau. Also, about 1 in every 5 children lived in families that fell below the poverty threshold. Poverty negatively affected American citizens and especially their children since they are dependent on others. Childhood poverty means that children might gone through inadequate nutrition; lower quality of educations; exposure to environmental toxins; or instability residence.                                            Source: Forbes.com The graph shows that 1 in 5 American children were at risk in living in poverty. America was ranked in the fifth worst OECD country and we can see clearly that this problem is bigger than we might think it would be. Poverty can substantial...

In October of this year, Donald Trump passed a budget resolution that cuts funding of food assistance programs like SNAP by 150 billion dollars. Because of this, many people will no longer be able to have access to food assistance because applying for assistance is becoming more and more complicated and time consuming.  This just goes to show that Trump, who advocated for the (white) working class during his candidacy for president, is a liar.  In 2013, Oregon had the highest usage of food assistance in the nation. Since then, the utilization of it has gone down, due to the economy getting better. Angela Helm says that, “ Contrary to (racist) popular belief, African ...

  It’s no secret that the world is experiencing an unprecedented demographic change in population for the first time in history. With the turn of the millennium, many countries are experiencing a major imbalance in elderly, adult, and children populations that is only expected to continuously rise until the elderly population overtakes that of young children. As the graph shows, demographers and economists believe this shift will happen around 2020 as these age groups continue to rise and decrease respectively opposite of previous human history. According to the Census Bureau, it’s estimated that people age 65 and above will make up 15.6% of the global population, more than double the estimated 7.2% for children ages 5 and under. Take a look at the expected change in countries around the world by 2050:  One of the main reasons for this is our prolonged life expectancy thanks to better living conditions that have allowed humans to live longe...

  Technological advancement has had an overwhelming effect on every aspect of our lives—from simple tasks such as making a cup of coffee to something so fantastical as space exploration. One aspect we often overlook or are unaware of is its effect on agriculture and how it’s changed how we grow and get access to our foods. Energy is the most important component to food growth. Over the course of our history, a constant increase in food production and the energy needed to complete it has been necessary to match the increasing world population. This imbalance of energy required to meet the required production levels has been so readily accessible to developed countries that food production more often accedes the amount required by the public resulting in massive wastes of foods. Developing countries (where we outsource many of our agricultural needs to) are experiencing the complete opposite problem. In these countries, energy tha...

This is a question that I know many of us in the 2017 Capstone are asking ourselves right now. It is also a question that society as a whole can be asking, through reading on our class' experience. Through this quarter, we have come to know the subject of Food Security in vulnerable populations intimately. We have researched the subject, and posted our findings together as a group on this blog.  We have also been hard at work maintaining our website , which will soon feature videos that we, and future classes in this Capstone have generated 100% on our own, under the guidance of our faculty and  staff of the Meals on Wheels People staff here in  Portland, Oregon.  Our class will go our separate ways at the end of the quarter. A new class will come in and take over. We will graduate, and we will move onto our various careers; but the issue of Food insecurity will still be here, and will still be very real.  Our hope is that we have been able to p...

When deciding how to benefit your community this holiday season, I encourage you to consider helping vulnerable senior citizens! Donating to help underprivileged seniors in your community is convenient for the giver and joyous for the recipient. Why consider helping seniors this holiday season? Daily Caring, a caregiver resource guide, informs that helping seniors is vital in part because over 12 million(close to 28%) seniors live alone, 21% of these seniors do not drive(which increases isolation and decreases access to resources), and hunger threatens over 9 million elderly every year. Senior citizens in your community are in dire need of assistance for necessities and the joy that a holiday surprise can bring! How can I brighten a seniors holiday? One of the ways you can brighten a seniors holiday is to partner with organizations that give to seniors who might not receive gifts this holiday season. One incredibly active organization that does just that is Be a Santa to a Senior...

Hard working organizations such as the Meals on Wheels People depend on monetary contributions to improve the lives of vulnerable populations. Many of these non-profit organizations are tax-exempt organizations, which means a monetary donor is eligible to apply their donation to a charitable tax deduction at the end of the year. We will do quick breakdown and overview of charitable tax deductions. This way as a potential monetary volunteer you have the knowledge to move forward with helping your community! What is a tax deduction?  A tax deduction is an amount that you subtract from your income before your income is considered for taxable earnings. The CS Monitor provides a simplified example of a tax deduction in practice. In this example person X makes a total of $9,000 in charitable donations during the year. This person makes a yearly salary of $50,000. At tax time they would subtract their charitable donations from their income ($50,000-$9,000) which brings their taxable fe...