Values Clarification

Natalie Betz, Zach Lively, Kody Meyer

Community

A community is made when a group of people with some common ground come together. Our work was primarily focussed on the queer community, which in itself has many different facets. The work we did in Atlanta gave us many insights on the varying experiences within the community.

Despite nearly 500,000 people living in Atlanta, the queer community is interwoven. Each of the non-profit organizations we worked with or visited had heard of one another. A few of them had previously worked together or shown support in other ways. It was nice to see how they work as a whole; it makes their queer community feel inclusive.

Leadership

Leadership can be seen in all that we did over the course of this trip. We got to follow leaders in their own community and learn what has and hasn't worked for them. We learned about Martin Luther King Jr. and other leaders of the Civil Rights Movements. All of the skills we learned and practiced on this trip we have brought back to the University of Iowa, where we will put them into work creating more effective leaders on campus.

Active Listening

Collectively, we heard many different personal stories that organizers courageously shared to us - complete strangers. We learned about some members' of the queer communities' struggle coming out. Some teenagers and young adults were kicked out of their homes due to their identity, while others struggled with drug addictions. As many people know, coming out is not always easy. However, when gay marriage was legalized it seemed like a saving grace for queer Georgian teens, yet the directer of Lost N Found Youth explained that afterwards, they had the most people they have ever had at their center. The new law sparked young people to come out to their families, which ultimately left them homeless.




Empathy

While in Atlanta, our group stayed in a Safe Home that also served as a homeless shelter. At our orientation, one of the leaders told us to ensure that we have conservations with their guests and look them in the eyes. It wasn't about our empathy, but rather helping them develop dignity. We learned that many homeless people do not feel self-worth, which is why it's important to help humanize them. Of course, this goes for all humans everywhere. Every person deserves to be treated with respect and nobility.



Self Love/Respect

The concept of self love is one that is particularly unique to the Atlanta team. Being LGBTQ+ focused and comprised mainly of queer individuals, many of us had very visceral experiences on our trip. The juxtaposition between working with independent queer leaders and those queer people that are heavily disenfranchised was palpable, yet a clear impression of strength and power rang true between both. This was empowering in ways that are difficult to articulate with words, and telling of the true formidability present in the LGBTQ+ community. The director of Lost N Found openly shared his harsh and, at times, hard to swallow narrative as a young, homeless, queer man in Atlanta. His comfortability expressing his story comes from years of telling it to kids in the exact situation he was in, using it as encouragement them to stick with the program. His success and commitment to the cause was nothing short of an inspiration to us.