The Impact WFTM has had on me...

Being involved in the 2008 “Warmth from the Millyard” warm clothing drive has been an amazing experience for me. Throughout the course of the semester I have been more and more impressed with not only the group of people that I have worked with on this project, but also the entire greater Manchester community as a whole. Admittedly, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I first began working on this project, and I may have even been pessimistic about the support that we would receive, but I am glad to say that I was completely wrong with my low expectations.
When we set our original goal of receiving more than the 800 items the project was able to gather last year, I had a feeling that we could achieve it, but I wasn’t sure if we would eclipse it by a great amount. I’ll admit that I had my doubts, especially with the economic downturn that the country has recently experienced and the fact that people are really trying to tighten their belts in these tough times. Clearly I was wrong in having these doubts, as we comfortably reached our goal….before we had even started the project!!! Although I originally thought that the tough economic times would discourage people from donating to our cause, it seems that the tough situation that the country has found itself in has actually motivated people to do more to help those with the greatest needs. This was a really eye opening realization for me, and it has restored a lot of my faith in the community that I have grown up in, as well as mankind as a whole.
While this project has reaffirmed to me that people are always willing to help, especially in the hardest of times, it has also opened my eyes to many of the issues that exist in the community that I live in that I may not have realized, and it has shown me that those issues affect everyone within that community. I was aware that there was a large homeless population in Manchester, however I was not aware of how serious the problem actually was and how little has been done to alleviate the problem. It seems that instead of people taking action against homelessness in Manchester, those who are in the best situations to fix this problem have been content to brush it aside and try to sweep it under the rug. If there is one homeless person living in Manchester, it doesn’t simply affect that one person, but it affects the entire community and brings the quality of that community down. Although we are not able to alleviate all of the problems that exist in our community as individuals, if we work together to raise awareness of these problems and agree to not tolerate them, eventually something will have to give, and something will be done.
When I first became a part of this project, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I have been pleasantly surprised. Being allowed to take a class that focuses not on information from books, or theories or formulas, and being able to focus on issues that are going on that many of us overlook but affect us all in many different ways has been an experience that I will treasure for the rest of my life. Although this is my last semester of my undergraduate collegiate experience and I became part of this project by chance more or less, there is definitely no way that I would trade being a part of this project for anything else I have experienced in my college years. Being able to make a difference in the community that I have grown up in and become very attached to has been something that I will carry with me for the rest of my life, and it has encouraged me to play a more active role in bringing to light the issues that many of us overlook everyday. I hope that the “Warmth from the Millyard” clothing drive continues to be run and grow after we have contributed our part to it, and I’m sure that the greater Manchester community will continue to be better off because of the efforts of this program to raise awareness about the issues that affect us all in our community.

Shane Rozamus