Getting Involved

Ask your group to share the day’s activity with their families at home around the dinner table. Have them talk about who is poor in America today, the conditions that impact the lives of the poor, and the ways their own families can help those in poverty find a way out. Then have your members discuss their families’ solutions in the group setting. Compare and contrast the differing views – and use the conflicting perceptions as an opening to a wider discussion of how America views the problem of poverty.

Explain to the group that, right now, there are people in their community living in poverty, for whom hunger is a daily occurrence and whom they can help by organizing a food drive at their school. Have your group create posters or flyers that they can distribute, telling about the problem of poverty in their community and asking others to donate food items to aid the hungry in their community. Contact a poverty-relief organization in your community to distribute the goods, then celebrate and publicize your group’s good effort through the local media. Such drives that include families and involve community organizations help reinforce the notion that different groups can work together for the good of the whole.