FALL 2023 | In This Issue Much More Than Shelter Q & A with our Overnight Shelter Program Manager Our Women’s Education Center Celebrates Progress Our President on Not Waiting to be Asked
NEWS
Introducing a New Holiday Card Join Us for Funny Women…Serious Business, November 7th
Much More Than Shelter Trina felt like she never had a family or place to call home. Raised by her stepmother, they made it work for a time, but with too many people living in the apartment, eventually she was forced to leave.
Q&A
JOYCE SMITH
OVERNIGHT SHELTER PROGRAM MANAGER Joyce Smith has been with Rosie’s Place for a decade. She first was a Front Desk Advocate before moving to positions in our Food Pantry and Overnight Shelter programs. Since 2021, Joyce has overseen our 20-bed Overnight Shelter Program, ensuring sanctuary and support for every guest who stays with us. What makes the Rosie’s Place Overnight Shelter unique? Our shelter doesn’t look like most shelters. It looks like an apartment or a dormitory. We have two floors of bedrooms, a wellequipped kitchen, dining area, laundry room and community space for our guests. More than anything, what sets our program apart is that our guests stay with us for three weeks. When a woman doesn’t have to worry about where she is sleeping every night, how she is going to eat and just survive each day, she has a chance to exhale, connect to our services and plan her next steps. Who stays in our Overnight Shelter? Our guests are young and old. They are women who due to one tragic setback, find themselves homeless for the first time. And they are women who due to trauma, mental illness or substance use disorder, may be chronically homeless. Women come to us from across town, out of state and sometimes even other countries. When a guest arrives, how is she welcomed? The first thing we tell every woman who stays with us is, “Please consider this your home for the next three weeks. We’re glad you’re here and we are here to help you.” Our team strives to give our guests all the support and comfort that we can in both little and big ways. This means providing pajamas and toiletries; or it could be getting a favorite hot sauce for a guest who misses her family’s cooking; buying a new walker for a guest who lost hers in the chaos of being homeless; or adjusting our schedules to accommodate a guest who works the night shift. Beyond shelter and respite, what other help does Rosie’s Place provide to guests staying with us? While we never ask a guest what brought her to us, we always ask her what she wants to work on while she’s with us. If a guest wants to work on getting housing or a job, we’ll connect her with our Housing Search or Employment Specialists. If she wants to work on her sobriety or mental health, we can connect her with our Recovery Support Navigator, our Clinical Social Worker, support groups or medical staff in our Wellness Center. Rosie’s Place has so many programs and services that we can always help.
With no one else to care for her, Trina navigated her teenage years on her own. She stayed with friends when she could but was never in one place long enough to finish school. When she found Rosie’s Place as a young adult, we welcomed her with compassion. We provided her with a bed in our Overnight Shelter Program along with a dresser, toiletries and pajamas. At Rosie’s Place, she could rest and gather her thoughts. Trina remembers, “I actually got to sleep on a bed! That was when I began feeling like I was safe.” During her three-week stay in our shelter, Trina could access all the services at Rosie’s Place. She did her laundry and cooked in the shared kitchen with groceries from our Food Pantry. She took time to catch her breath and then started on her next steps. With our help, Trina searched for a job and housing. When she shared that she wanted to go back to school, we
connected her to a GED program. In time, Trina secured a catering position, enrolled in classes to complete her degree and moved into her own apartment. Proud of what she’d accomplished, Trina kept taking strides forward. She started a program to become a home health worker, and Rosie’s Place paid for her tuition. Just when she felt settled, Trina began struggling with serious health issues. She lost her job and fell behind in rent. Panicked, she turned to Rosie’s Place once again. When Trina called our helpline, we welcomed her back with open arms. We stabilized her crisis, preventing her eviction with rental assistance and negotiating with her landlord to establish a payment plan for the months ahead. Today, Trina works as a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) and is considering a degree in Nursing. She keeps in touch and updates us on her progress during monthly check-ins. In this way, she remains connected to support—ensuring she can stay on track with her rent and in meeting her goals. Most of all, Trina no longer feels alone. She has a family now at Rosie’s Place, filled with friends she can rely on and people who care for her.
Trina’s face lights up as she talks about what her life is like now. “When I look back at where I started from, I feel like I accomplished a lot. To get the high school diploma, the CNA license…to being able to have a job like everyone else…to have something you are calling your own, after all you’ve been through…I start crawling, and then walk, and then I’m flying!” Trina came to Rosie’s Place looking for a safe place to spend the night. Thanks to friends like you, she found so much more. With assistance from Rosie’s Place, she transformed her life.
Our Women’s Education Center
Celebrates Progress! English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) students in our Women’s Education Center (WEC) spent this past semester writing, workshopping and typing pieces about the many ways one can make progress—from learning a new language to starting a new job. We compiled their work into a book titled Celebrating Progress, which our longtime friends at Bridgeport National Bindery generously published for us. Students dedicated the book with the following inscription: “In class, we make progress together correcting our writing, adding new words like
“delightful” and typing it up ourselves. We dedicate this book to the Rosie’s Place community, and our families who will read, share and expand on our ideas. We hope our families around the world will learn to write as we have and feel part of the Rosie’s Place family as we do.” We celebrated this beautiful new book with readings in our classrooms and a reception in our Dining Room. We are so proud to welcome and support our students from around the world. Their persistence and progress inspire us!