Burlington is a small city with wide diversity. It is home to families, college students, and professionals – as well as a large homeless population.

Champlain College allows its students and faculty to find out for themselves what it's like to be a part of the homeless population through a program called Tent City.

For the project, students give up all technology and luxuries for four nights and five days, sleeping outside for some or all of the week. Almost no one stays outside the entire time, George said.

Samantha Thatcher and Joseph Mester, though, were two students who chose to sleep outside for all four nights.

 “I feel that one cannot truly gain that appreciation or understanding unless they have been in a similar situation themselves-- make themselves vulnerable to the criticism the population faces each day, the dread of going to bed at night still hungry and knowing that a frigid night lays ahead,” Thatcher wrote in an e-mail.

Though she admits to not experiencing everything a homeless person might, Thatcher wrote that she “felt the impact emotionally/mentally and physically as I became sleep-deprived and sick.”

“Spending my days out pan handling for money is truly an experience,” Mester wrote in an e-mail.

The project gives students a taste of what those less fortunate go through. The school also creates an academic experience out of it.

“Tent City is an educational and awareness raising project that happens every year during National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness week,” said Ashley George, Service Coordinator of Champlain College.

Most students participate for 24 hours, and are required to attend lectures and reflection circles.

The project has helped shape Thatcher’s academic path.

“After hearing from representatives and clients of Spectrum Youth and Family Services, I've decided that I would like to pursue a volunteer or internship position there,” she wrote.

Though Thatcher said Tent City is certainly not an exact replica of the life of a homeless person, she feels it inspires a deeper appreciation for those who live in such conditions day in and day out.

“Tent City is so important because it gives students, staff and faculty the opportunity to either see or experience what it might feel like to actually be homeless; the tents on the lawn, the cardboard "beds" strewn everywhere,” Thatcher wrote.

Mester wrote, “Sleeping on some cardboard and concrete with a blanket is not the most comfortable thing but it is definitely something to experience.”

Tent City is held on Champlain College’s campus every year to raise money for Committee On Temporary Shelter, known as COTS, and educate the community about the ever-growing problem of homelessness, George said.

This year, 105 people participated, raising almost $2,000 for COTS. Through this program, Thatcher said she learned many new things, especially about herself.

 “Going a week without my cell phone was a blessing in disguise, eating only what I needed and not just whatever I wanted made me realize how overindulgent I was, being freezing cold at night and refusing (most nights) to go into a tent or inside was a way of proving the existence of the willpower I have within myself,” Thatcher said.

 

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