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You can help UCAN, and those we serve, by educating others about why it’s important we address poverty.
Advocacy includes many different types of activities. You can research new solutions, create coalitions of people like yourself, educate folks, raise awareness about poverty and much more.
The goal of advocacy is to create change. To address poverty, you might:
You can advocate whenever you connect with people. This may include:
When you advocate about poverty, you share facts that help others better understand poverty, its causes, and its impacts. Doing so, you build support to take action to address poverty. Here are some facts to share when advocating.
The U.S. defines poverty based on whether folks earn enough to meet their household’s food needs. This greatly undercounts the number of people who struggle to make ends meet. The nation’s definition does not take into account other common expenses of daily living, such as health care and housing costs. 75,000 local residents wake up each morning having to decide which basic needs they will be able to meet that day.
The most common causes of poverty are things folks don’t have much control over.
Imagine having to choose whether to give your children three meals a day, or pay a utility bill to keep the lights on. These difficult decisions lead to high levels of stress not faced by those with more resources. Worse, people living in poverty face shame and humiliation, even though many are hard workers who find creative ways to live with less. Stress, shame and humiliation make it more difficult for children to learn, for adults to focus at work, and for people to stay healthy.
