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Dear MCB'ers,
I saw this and thought that while many of you probably know about
this program, some may not and it might be of interest to you. ~Anne
From the UCB Web Feature, 3/8/2006
Suitcase Clinic student volunteers are changing
the world, one bare footstep at a time
By Bonnie Azab Powell, NewsCenter | 8 March 2006
BERKELEY - On a chilly Tuesday night, about 40
homeless and low-income men and a couple of women
are lined up outside the First Presbyterian
Church in Berkeley. They are waiting for the
doors to open at 7 p.m. for the Suitcase Clinic,
an all-volunteer medical- and social-services
operation run by Berkeley undergraduates with
help from graduate students and local
practitioners.
Once inside, they grab free bagels and coffee and
quickly settle into another line, this one of
chairs, as Suitcase coordinators write down their
names and which services they hope to receive
that night. "I come for the chiropractor: he
straightens me out and makes me feel more
balanced," explains John, a thin, bleary-eyed man
who cheerfully discloses that he's schizophrenic.
"And because I love talking to the students," he
adds before meandering off to do just that.
(John's name, and that of other Suitcase Clinic
clients, have been changed or omitted to protect
their privacy.)
Another client, who says he is "nobody important,
just a guy trying to get himself together," waits
for a free haircut from one of Suitcase's
volunteer barbers. A quiet, well-spoken redhead
visits Suitcase "to share, hear, and express
ideas. And to have a chiropractic and get my feet
washed."
A hand-lettered sign lets Clinic clients know what's available each evening.
The students themselves are drawn by even less
tangible things. "It's a unique opportunity to
talk to people who under normal circumstances you
might not," says Nancy Nguyen, a fourth-year
anthropology major. Others give reasons such as
"because I feel like I'm getting too selfish" and
"to fill a part of life that I can't from just
being a student."
The volunteers' motivation seems to boil down to
something very simple. "I really enjoy just
showing up and knowing there's a possibility I
could help someone," says Jake Becker, a
vampiric, lip-ringed junior (a major in
biochemistry and religious studies) who helps
coordinate Suitcase's Youth Clinic. Then he
shrugs, tacitly acknowledging that it's cooler
these days to be cynical and ironic than sincere
and passionate. "You can't expect to change the
world here, because you'll be disappointed. But
maybe you can help one person, and that's
inspiring to me."
Nancy Nguyen, a fourth-year anthropology
major, fills up shampoo bottle for free hygiene
kits.
Nancy Nguyen, a fourth-year anthropology major,
fills up small shampoo bottles for free hygiene
kits.
Nancy Nguyen, a fourth-year anthropology
major, fills up shampoo bottle for free hygiene
kits.
CARE and administrative coordinator Kara Bagley
helps a client with putting together a r=E9sum=E9.
Bagley is a third-year English, political
science, and African-American studies major.
Nancy Nguyen, a fourth-year anthropology
major, fills up shampoo bottle for free hygiene
kits.
Boalt Hall law student Abe Gardner provides legal advice.
Foot-washing and chiropractor services are among
the most popular offerings of the Suitcase
Clinic. Depending on which local health
volunteers are available to work alongside them,
the students also provide basic health-care
checkups, vision screening, dental care, legal
advice, social work, and a discussion group at
the General Clinic on Tuesdays. The students also
hold two separate clinics on Mondays: a Women's
Clinic at the Dwight Women's Shelter (with
additional manicure, pedicure, and childcare
services) and a Youth Clinic, temporarily housed
at First Presbyterian, where rock music and a
dinner prepared by the students entice its
authority-mistrusting young clients to come in.
Berkeley students are known for their commitment
to public service - more than a third of
undergraduates volunteer in the community during
the school year, according to a survey by the
Office of Student Research, and another 10
percent perform community service for pay or
course credit. The Cal Corps Public Service
Center, the campus unit that coordinates and
supports student public-service opportunities,
oversees dozens of community programs, from
tutoring and mentoring projects to Cal Habitat
for Humanity, a house-building organization.
But even in this impressive group, the Suitcase
Clinic stands out for its longevity, scope, and
level of commitment. Founded in 1989 by
first-year students in the Berkeley-UCSF Joint
Medical Program as a mobile clinic that would
travel directly to homeless clients, the program
was named for the suitcases in which the medical
students carried their supplies. Eventually,
those supplies were transported in a donated van;
when the van broke down, the students moved for
good into First Presbyterian. The church provides
the Suitcase Clinic with its own locked room in
which to store all their supplies, including the
hygiene kits they put together and boxes of
donated clothing, and space to conduct the
clinic's various services. Its janitors also
clean up afterward.
They do it all
Undergraduates helped develop the clinic
initially, and soon took over its administration.
"We run the show," says Jena Desai, one of three
General Clinic coordinators and a fourth-year
public-health and biochemistry double major.
"People are amazed that we can do it all."
It's a big job, requiring 5 to 10 hours a week
from its leaders. About 40 students share
responsibility for the three clinics as well as
for a semester-long course, Health and Medical
Sciences 98/198 - not a DeCal class - that
would-be volunteers must pass before being
allowed to work at Suitcase. There are 47
students currently taking it.
Taught by veteran Suitcase volunteers and
sponsored by the Health and Medical Sciences
Division in the School of Public Health, the
course trains students in the skills they need
for the clinic. "The first part is about security
- for example, how to handle sexual harassment
and de-escalate conflict," explains Mira
Lalchandani, one of the class coordinators this
semester as well as a Suitcase administrator and
fourth-year public-health and molecular and cell
biology double major. "We also help students
practice doing active listening, asking
open-ended questions, and role-playing. We want
them to be prepared for anything."
In the second part of the class, student leaders
bring in faculty experts as guest lecturers to
discuss more general issues related to
homelessness. "Racism, sexism, drug and alcohol
abuse, mental illness, unemployment -
homelessness encompasses pretty much every social
problem," says Desai.
Shadows and hoops
This Tuesday night, First Presbyterian is a hive
of frenetic activity. Twenty or so experienced
volunteers are showing 10 "shadows" the ropes,
since the midterm is approaching. (In order to
pass the two-credit course, students have to work
at least three nights of the clinic during the
semester.) A fast and furious game of two-on-two
is ricocheting around the church's indoor
basketball court. Other, less energetic visitors
are watching a movie brought in by the clinic's
security guard, a favor he performs every week.
General Clinic coordinators Jena Desai, Christina
Chun, and Natalie Khorochev coordinate calling
names and directing clients to the services
they'll receive that night.
Chun and Khorochev pull clients' files to hand
off to that caseworkers for the evening.
But most Suitcase guests are milling around,
talking to the volunteers. Once their names are
called, clients are greeted by a student
caseworker, who sits with them to record or
update a basic social and medical history before
helping them navigate the services being offered
in various rooms. For example, when Joanne, an
attractive elderly woman in a purple jacket who
takes the bus every week from downtown Oakland to
the clinic, told her caseworker, Lalchandani,
that she was still having problems with her
landlord, Lalchandani made sure she was signed up
for the legal services table. She then sat with
Joanne while the Boalt Hall School of Law student
volunteer explained her options in taking the
landlord to court.
Elsewhere in First Presbyterian, a medical
student from the Berkeley-UCSF joint program is
giving basic health consultations and dispensing
over-the-counter medications. A graduate student
from the School of Optometry is performing
preliminary eye examinations. (Those who need
glasses are then scheduled for a full exam on the
Berkeley campus; frames are donated and the
lenses subsidized by the Suitcase Clinic.) And a
Suitcase undergraduate is walking clients over to
a dental clinic a few blocks away that ends up
handling three checkups and basic cleanings this
evening.
On the third floor, in a small circle of chairs,
a group of 10 or so students and clients is
meeting for the Suitcase discussion group called
SHARE, "Searching How to Achieve Respect and
Empowerment." Tonight a story in the Daily
Californian about homeless students in Berkeley
has sparked a heated intellectual debate on the
origins, types of, and possible solutions to
homelessness.
"Just to assume that because someone's homeless
as a child they're going to become a homeless
adult is wrong," exclaims a small woman in
glasses who says she used to be a security guard
before the loss of her job deposited her on the
streets. "Homelessness is not like alcoholism.
Jobs are too hard to get and rents are too high,
and a lot of people can't function under those
circumstances."
Back downstairs in the large main room, an
undergraduate "client advocate for residence and
employment" staffs the "CARE" station, providing
housing and food referrals, helping clients
compose r=E9sum=E9s on her laptop, and looking at job
listings in the newspaper and online that might
be a match for their skills. Nguyen is carefully
filling up miniature shampoo bottles from a
family-size version, in between handing out
hygiene kits with soap, a razor, shampoo,
toothpaste, and dental floss to anyone who asks.
In her labeled plastic bins she also has
health-education pamphlets with information on
drug and alcohol abuse and quitting smoking.
The students do not discuss such activities
unless their clients bring them up. "Suitcase is
about serving our clientele in a nonjudgmental
way," explains Desai, who has been volunteering
with Suitcase since she was a freshman. "We're
not trying to change people's behaviors, unless
they want to."
Volunteer barber Ross Robinson first came for
legal advice but came back to share his own
skills.
People were happily rummaging through the
Clinic's stockpile of donated clothing.
Two community volunteers are zipping shears and
clippers over the heads and beards of willing
victims draped in plastic sheets. One of the
barbers, Ross Robinson, who makes his living with
a moving business, says he first came to the
clinic to seek legal advice. He has been coming
back for the past four months to offer his
considerable cosmetic skills. "I saw the
benevolence, the caring, the students had, and I
thought, hey, I have something to offer too,"
Robinson explains.
Near the haircut station, two students crouch
over plastic tubs in which they are gently
washing bare feet. As they pumice away calluses
and clip toenails before patting the appendages
dry and handing over clean, donated socks, they
chat with their clients - that is, unless the
happy recipient has fallen asleep.
Chatting in comfort
The footwashing service is one of the most vital
that the clinic performs, says Desai. "Many of
our clients are on their feet or walking for most
of the day. They don't get to take showers very
often or change their socks," she explains. With
a smile, she adds, "Mainly, clients love to talk,
and they're a lot more comfortable doing it when
someone is washing their feet."
One of the amateur pedicurists is wearing a black
sweatshirt printed with the famous Mahatma Gandhi
command - "Be the change you want to see in the
world" - that has inspired activists everywhere.
Fittingly, it's the official Suitcase Clinic
hoodie. The effects may not be immediately
visible, but these Berkeley students are, with
their eyes open and their egos checked at the
door of First Presbyterian, devoting several
hours a week to embodying change.
"Sometimes I feel discouraged because it seems
like a lot of Band-Aid work, and I wonder why we
can't make more of a difference in this person's
life," Desai admits. "But someone once told me
not to look at it as, 'Let's get everyone off the
streets.' We have to help them in the way they
need. And we do that."
The Suitcase Clinic accepts donations ranging
from cash to clothes (socks in particular),
hygiene supplies, and household items. For more
information, or to offer professional services,
visit the organization's website,
suitcase.berkeley.edu.
*Some names of Suitcase Clinic clients have been
omitted or changed to protect their privacy. Back
to top
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