THE INSIDER - SPRING/SUMMER 2023

SOCIAL WORK PARTICIPATES IN POVERTY SIMULATION

Texas College Social Work Club students participate in a poverty simulation hosted by the East Texas Human Needs Network.

Numerous Social Work Club students participated in the Poverty Simulation hosted by the East Texas Human Needs Network this spring. The poverty simulation experience is deigned to help audiences begin to understand what it might be like to live in a typical low - income family trying to survive from month to month. The simulation brought over 80 student participants from all over East Texas, inclusive of students from Texas College, East Texas Baptist University, Tyler Independent School District, Tyler Junior College, as well as other local groups and organizations. As participants, students assumed the role of 26 different families facing poverty. Immersed in a variety of simulated scenarios and contexts, some families were newly unemployed, some were recently deserted by the family’s “breadwinner,” some were homeless, and others were recipients of TANF, or Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, either with or without additional earned income. Other participants were senior citizens receiving disability, on social security, or were grandparents raising their grandchildren. The task of the “families” were to survive four 15 - minute “weeks” and provide basic necessities and shelter. To do so they would visit different stations around the room such as social services, payday loans, healthcare services, 15