Hurley, Va

Introduction

Most people know that one of the cornerstones of the Notre Dame experience and education is a commitment to service. Service has always been a large part of my life throughout high school, and now in college. Though I enjoy doing service and believe that it is important as a way to contribute to your community, I am only beginning to understand the full purpose of service in our lives. My goal while in Hurley, Virginia was to do the best I could to make a difference in the community, but also to learn about the problems that the Appalachian region faces, and to contemplate solutions to these problems. I arrived in Appalachia with the idea that I understood the problems such as poverty, inadequate health care, and environmental issues that the region faced, and had a pretty good understanding of how these problems could be addressed. Through my experiences working with the Hurley community center and talking with the people of the community I learned that my perception of these problems was wrong, and this changed my understanding of their solutions as well. I believe this realization outlines the most valuable lesson that I took away from my experiences in Appalachia; In order to make a difference it is important to fully understand the problems that exist in our society, and although you may not be able to fix every problem in the time that you have the greatest benefit of this kind of service is in involving yourself in the community and learning from them.

From Spe Salvi: Encyclical Letter of His Holiness Benedict XVI on Christian Hope, Libreria Editrice Vaticana: 2007. ¶ 35. http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20071130_spe-salvi_en.html

Pre-Immersion Research

Before going to Appalachia, I through the pre immersion classes and outside research, I tried to gain an understanding of the types of problems I would be encountering in the region. I learned that due to the isolation of the area and the lack of jobs there are poverty rates as high as 27% in some areas of the region. This in turn leads to other problems in the region such as inadequate health care and education. The Appalachian Regional Commission Website is a useful resource for information about these problems and programs they have in place to address these problems.
Appalachia regional commission: http://www.arc.gov/index.jsp

Pre-Immersion Ideas

After attending the pre-immersion classes and learning about the situation in Appalachia I believed that I had a pretty good understanding of these problems and possible solutions to them. At the root of the problem of poverty is the lack of industries and jobs in Appalachia. With the economy on the down turn, and the technological advances in the coal mining industry, many people have been left without jobs. Furthermore, the lack of adequate education for many people does not allow them the opportunity to pursue certain careers, and many people that do pursue further education seem to leave the region for their career. Before going to Appalachia I thought the only way to address this problem would be to start promoting better education, and further education at a younger age. If children could be motivated to focus on their education at a younger age then the education of the community as a whole could improve. Hopefully this would lead to growth in the community as well.

Experiences in Appalachia

The first thing I noticed about the people of Hurley, Virginia was that they were happy. I was expecting to go to the region and witness extreme poverty, and people in need of my help. After further examination, it is true that Hurley was obviously more impoverished region then I had ever seen, but you would never know it from talking to the people there. They were truly happy with their lives and although they were happy that we were there and accepting of help that we could give, they were in no way needy. All the people seemed content and optimistic, and it took some deeper conversations to learn about any problems that they were dealing with. For example, I was working on putting insulation and dry wall in a warehouse, and the man in charge of helping us was named Jim. Jim was so happy to work with us and so patient with out lack of construction knowledge. After a couple of days I began to realize that Jim could not possibly be getting paid for this work, and I wondered how he actually made a living. When I asked him what his job was, he informed me that he didn’t work and he just helped out as much as he could at the community center. I was so impressed with the tightness of the community and the willingness of all of its neighbors to help out as much as they could.

A Solution to the Problem

After working with Jim and his brother Greg for a couple of days, meeting their children and talking with their families, I realized that my previous evaluation of the problems and their possible solutions in Appalachia was inadequate. I believed that like me, all people in Appalachia wanted a further education, and were not content in their current situation. In my experiences, however, this was not true. The people seemed to be content and greatful with what they had, and in my opinion they had a better outlook on what is important in life than many people that I know. Instead of being obsessed with their career, their job, or material things, the people seemed more focused instead on their relationships with their families, their friends and their community. They were proud to be a part of the Hurley community and it is hard for me to see very many people wanting to change their community at all. I came in with the idea that the problems of poverty in the region could easily be solved with better early education, but now I am not sure if this is true. I think it would take deeper changes, and more economical stimulus to make real changes in the society.

Making a Difference?

In Hurley, I was hoping to be able to feel like I was making an important and lasting impact in the community. Working on insulation and drywalls in the warehouse, I was at first very discouraged. There were ten of us working at the same site, with only enough tools for about five people to work at a time, and with out lack of any construction knowledge it sometimes seemed that we were doing more harm than helping. I was discouraged that I was not doing enough, and wishing that I could do more. It took a couple of days, but I began to realize that the main purpose of service in general is not to immediately solve a problem and change a community but to immerse yourself in that community. By doing this, and talking to the people there, you can gain a greater understanding of the problems that exist. You can use this knowledge to work towards finding longer standing significant solutions to social problems. This principal is evident in my udnerstnaidng of the problems in Appalachia. Though I contributed to drywalling a warehouse I think the real impact I will have will be in the type of person that I develop in to and how I contribute to improving our society in the future. Through talking to the people in Appalachia, and working with them, I gained a greater understanding of who they were, and the problems that they faced. I hope I will be able to use this knowledge in my future life, and when I have a greater skill set, and means for helping people I will be able to make a greater impact.

It is comforting to know that we are not alone in our effort to help the people of the Appalachian region. I learned that there are many other groups like us that go down to that region to spend time with the people and to try to contribute through service. There are many organizations like the Christian Appalachian organization dedicated to helping make a change.
http://www.christianapp.org/

Conclusions

After reflecting on my experiences in Appalachia I was at first a little discouraged. Not only did I discover that I did not fully understand the problems that our society faces today, such as poverty and poor education, but I know longer believed that I knew a clear and distinct way to solve these problems. Furthermore, no matter how much time you find to devout to service and to try to solving these problems, you will never be able to do so alone. In Appalachia, and in other service projects I have participated in, I have a felt overwhelmed at the idea that even if I accomplish one thing in the time, there is still much more to do. It can be a discouraging thought but I think that the Oscar Romero Prayer describes well the catholic philosophy of service, and can be very comforting. It is necessary to keep in mind that we are one person, trying to do God’s work, and we may not see any results or significant changes, but we must remember that God has a plan. All we can do is our best, and God can do the rest.

Here is a portion of the prayer by Oscar Romero that I liked the best.
Prayer by Oscar Romero

We cannot do everything
and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something,
and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way,
an opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results,
but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders,
ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.

Prayer by Oscar Romero
http://www.simonbarrow.net/reflect3.html