ABOUT US

Our Group - 

Our group is made of four Discovery College (Hong Kong) students: Kate Walsh, Anna Zhao, Naomi Denniss and Nancy Li. During our PYP Exhibition, we found out about how many people were homeless. Most people had been kicked out of their homes from high rent, low income or if they were domestic workers who had caught Covid 19, they were unemployed and were sent away to crowded boarding houses, council flats or even worse - the streets. 

In Hong Kong, 1600 people are homeless and the numbers are still on the rise. Most have mental or psychological issues like PTSD (post- traumatic stress disorder) or disabilities. Most who were homeless didn't have any friends or family to go and live with, which was the problem in most cases. So away we went, spending 10 weeks researching NGOs, meeting the CEO of ImpactHK - Jeff Rotmeyer, volunteering during the weekend AND during school hours (thank you Ms. Cann & Ms. Fisher!), searching our laptops for articles and forcing down paywalls. 

When our group realised that we had to have something to present and display, Anna and Nancy zoomed away on a giant 6-foot-tall infographic, Kate prepared bracelets and small gifts to hand out and Naomi worked really hard on a poster and our website. In the end, it was okay .

Our group had a mentor to help us plan and direct: Mr. Sean Smith, who was Naomi's, Anna's and Kate's Year 5 teacher. With mentor meetings once a week at 2:10 - 2:50 pm, our group managed to sign up for volunteering, assign jobs to people and take notes from researching. 

Who We Are - 

Hi everyone, my name is Kate. I'm 10 years old and I picked the topic of homelessness because I care a LOT about the people who are less fortunate than us, like the homeless. The reason homelessness came to mind was because I care about the homeless people on the streets. Whenever I see someone begging for money, my heart breaks and I immediately want to help them. There are a lot of charities and one of them is ImpactHK, a charity that helps to make Hong Kong a better place for people to live and for people to live better lives. To do that doesn't just happen over night, it takes time, so I'm trying to spread awareness to the younger generation. I hope you enjoy learning about homelessness and how we could help those on the streets. This is why I chose homelessness as my topic.  

Alright. Hi, my name is Anna. I'm 11 years old and I picked the topic of homelessness because I care about the people who are on the streets. They often have to go without resources that we often take for granted: a shower, clean water, food, nutrition and even a bed or blankets! I also picked the topic of homelessness because I can imagine what it feels like to be homeless and I hate the idea of millions of people sleeping on the streets. Every time I see a homeless person, I feel guilty and really upset because I can't do anything to help them. So, that's why I chose homelessness as my topic for Exhibition.

Uh, hi. I'm Naomi, 10 years old. I chose to advocate for homelessness... BECAUSE WOULD YOU LIKE IT IF YOU HAD TO SLEEP ON THE STREETS ON A VERY COLD WINTER'S NIGHT WITH COCKROACHES CRAWLING RIGHT NEXT TO YOU? And also because my stubbornness helps me stand up for a topic when the people on the streets have no say in what happened to them. 

Hi, my name is Nancy and I'm 11 years old. I chose this topic because I care about homelessness and it breaks my heart sometimes when I see a homeless person on the street begging for money or food, especially when that person has a disability. I want to discover about homelessness. I also want to know how to help them. We already volunteered at ImapctHK. We did a kindness walk, which is in short, giving out food and necessities.