Survivor to survivor
Step by step, each foot is carefully placed on the scale. The circular motion of the pixels loading on the screen seems to last forever.
Then, a number appears.
Numbers.
They disguise themselves as dictators, holding monopoly over your mind, whispering in your ear, telling you to obsess.
What size? What weight? How many calories? Who is looking? When is the next meal?
More than 30 million people in the US alone suffer from an eating disorder, with Anorexia Nervosa being the most deadly mental illness and 3rd most common chronic illness.
Battling with Anorexia and being a survivor herself, senior Nina Collard came up with a way to reach out to others who were working to overcome their own eating disorders.
In addition, as the USPS has been experiencing unexpected change in funding, there have been many movements attempting to support the USPS in order to prevent its collapse.
With both a passion for helping others and the USPS, Collard created a pen-pal program for people with eating disorders.
“After learning that the USPS was being defunded, I knew I had to do something to help,” Collard said. “ The fact that it is an election year where many people will be voting through mail in ballots only made the need to help more pressing. I knew I wanted to do a pen pal campaign and the idea of marketing it to solely eating disorder survivors just kind of came to me on a whim.”
Starting this campaign has allowed for Collard to develop her own personal way of helping the USPS.
“By creating a program that requires letter writing rather than email or something else, we are supporting the postal service,” Collard said. “Essentially each letter sent is another stamp purchased directly from the USPS.”
Using her personal experiences, Collard made sure to prioritize her program, Survivor to Survivor, as a safe space for participants.
“I want the people who signed up to have someone to confide in that will truly understand what they are going through,” Collard said. “Eating disorders are an extremely isolating disease and I want them to know that they aren’t alone. I want to give a sense of community to anyone struggling with any type of eating disorder.”
So far, Collard has had 200 people sign up using a google form and has gained participants from all over the world.
“I created a google form for people to sign up on that included a few different questions to answer,” Collard said. “Then I went through the list of people and paired them up based on their interests, which took forever, but was totally worth it.”
Currently being caught up with managing the campaign and its success in the first round, Collard has hopes for more letters to be sent between participants in the future.
“I’m not directly paired with anyone, but I do plan on sending handwritten thank you notes to everyone for participating,” Collard said. “The original form I created closed on September first. However, I would absolutely love to be able to do another round of this campaign and I will if I feel that there are enough people interested.”
Collard was extremely thankful to have received such positive feedback for her program, and even got endorsed by Project Heal, an organization working to educate and on the reality behind eating disorders.
“I spread information through my personal social media and I also reached out to various organizations that focus on spreading awareness about eating disorders,” Collard said. “I was lucky enough to have an amazing organization called Project Heal share my campaign on their social media pages which I definitely attribute a huge amount of my success to. I also have to give an enormous shout out to all of my friends who gave me so much love and support all while helping me spread information about this project.”
Receiving such grateful support from so many people has been rewarding for Collard, causing her to be reflective on her own journey with an eating disorder.
“Everyone I’ve reached out to has been super excited about participating and I have already made some new friends,” Collard said. “I am so grateful for the outpouring of love I have gotten. I was officially diagnosed in 2016, but I had been struggling with various forms of disordered eating for pretty much as long as I can remember. For a long time I was terrified to share that part of my life with even my closest friends. I was ashamed of myself and I worried what people would think and say about me.”
With strength, and admirable determination, Collard decided she wanted to make a change in her life and work towards recovery.
“About two years ago something just clicked,” Collard said. “I decided that if sharing my story could help someone else in any way at all, then I would share it, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.”
Adding to her list of outstanding achievements, Collard also worked as an intern with creator of the Research and Development League of San Antonio, Kate Kinnison.
“The focus of this internship was to work on each person’s leadership skills,” Collard said. “Every week of the program we listened to a speech from a different speaker on different aspects of leadership. My small group leader Beau Anderson was also incredible, he really brought the program to life for me”
With this great opportunity, Collard was able to learn things she didn’t know before about growing into a mature and thoughtful leader.
“Before this program I thought I had a good grasp on leadership and what it takes to be a great leader,” Collard said. “However, I learned so much more about leadership and what qualities leaders should strive to have.”
Having such powerful dedication to whatever project she sets her mind to, whether that be helping others with eating disorders, creating a program to support the USPS, or participating in an internship with local government officials, Collard has remained consistent in striving to be a beacon of light for the many people struggling with the same hopelessness which comes with an eating disorder that she once faced herself.
“There are a million things I wish I could say to everyone who has an eating disorder, said Collard. “I think the first thing I want them to know is that there is no shame in having an eating disorder, it doesn’t mean that there is something wrong with you. It just means that your brain works a little differently than other peoples and that is okay.” By Amanda Guapp
The book mobile
A memory of watching an old 70’s movie about a killer house, led to the fascination of finding new information for one little girl. Every time she walked up the steps of her local library, she felt she was on a mission to discover something new, and hoped to one day share this experience with others.
This little girl grew up to become our very own librarian, Lucy Podmore.
Podmore, with the help of library assistant Amanda Carr, assembled her own library on wheels using an ordinary school bus to transport books to our campus’ students to deliver these opportunities to students, even through a global pandemic.
“This was something I considered implementing when I knew English teachers were requiring an independent reading book for their students,” Podmore said. “We already offer curbside pickup for our students who can drive themselves up to Clark, so this was really an effort to help our students who didn’t have a way to get to Clark on their own.”
The bus took to the streets, decorated with a campus banner, just one week after inspiration struck.
“We work quickly here,” Podmore said. “I just asked permission from our administrators and they were so supportive, asking me how they could help in this effort. Mrs. Carr and I then prepped our materials.”
The bus was used to transport the library carts, tables, and of course books. About 100 fiction novels were aboard.
“We posted a poll on our Instagram account (@ClarkTxLib) and the overwhelming response was fiction,” Podmore said, “We brought some from each of our fiction sections.”
The mobile library visited the four elementary schools that feed into campus and were thought to be within walking distance of most students.
“Students placed books on hold prior to the bookmobile and we brought those books to the stops,” Podmore said. “Some students just needed recommendations so I pulled a few books from the ones we brought.”
Students can check out up to three books at a time through the campus library system.
“The library checkout program is an app,” Podmore said. “Mrs. Carr and I were able to check out books via our phones.”
This being a ‘COVID-19 inspired idea,’ precautions had to be taken in order to ensure everyone’s safety.
“We wiped down our tables, used hand sanitizer before and after handling items, and we asked everyone who visited to do the same,” Podmore said. “And of course, everyone was wearing masks.”
From the young age of 5, Podmore was a frequent reader, and now shares her love of books with our students. From her “wheel of names,” to her annual attendance at Library Palooza, Podmore takes every chance to interact with the community, and her mobile library is no exception to this. Podmore was even recognized in Texas as a TCEA library and media specialist in 2015.
“That was really really special because to me, that sort of broke open the idea of associating librarians with technology,” Podmore said. “When I won that award, people were like, ‘you’re right, you do a lot with technology and with helping teachers learn new tools and softwares and helping students master some things’”
Fortunately, if you missed the mobile library, Podmore has organized another opportunity for students to easily access books, now that some have returned to campus.
“What I have been doing is the little pop up library that I did yesterday, and that’s going to be a Monday and Thursday thing now,” Podmore said. “Right now we can’t have kids wander freely, so there hasn’t been any student traffic in the library, so that’s why we took the pop up library out into the courtyard.” By Kira Sandys
Make-A-Wish
She’s one in a million.
From hospital rooms to hotels with an ocean view.
Through her perseverance battling a rare disease, juvenile dermatomyositis (JDM), freshman Daysia Alarcon was granted a Make-a-Wish trip to Waikiki, Hawaii.
“In the beginning I was just determined to get back to normal,” Alarcon said. “Now I’m determined to go into remission.”
Very few people are diagnosed with this disease, but she continues to look at the bright side and looks forward to her trip funded by the Make-a-Wish Foundation.
“A quote on quote anonymous person nominates you,” Alarcon said. “At that point, the Make-a-Wish Foundation will go through your medical records and see if you qualify for a wish.”
Once qualifying for a Make-a-Wish, a representative will contact the recipient and let them know.
“I went in for my treatment one day,” Alarcon said. “A Make-a-Wish representative came into my hospital room and told me the good news.”
An initial meeting is set up to discuss possible wishes, including some restrictions in making their wish.
“Some being that there cannot be any construction and there cannot be a wish granted for someone else,” Alarcon said. “You also cannot wish to meet Justin Bieber, apparently he’s off limits.”
There are many restrictions to the Make-a-Wish Foundation, but recipients have a wide range of trips and activities to choose from.
“The trip is for a week,” Alarcon said. “Five nights and six days, another restriction [saying the trip] cannot be longer than seven days.”
Alarcon plans on making her trip in the summer of 2021, although it may end up being postponed depending on if COVID is still a concern.
“I am taking my immediate family which includes my younger brother, mom, and dad,” Alarcon said. “I’ll also be taking some friends [including] Carla Aguilar, Diego Aguilar, and their mom and dad.”
Although her family friends’ trip is not all exclusive with her wish, Alarcon was able to grant them some perks, including their flights and a hotel.
“I’ve always wanted to go to Hawaii since I was young,” Alarcon said. “I love the ocean and I’m naturally just drawn to the water.”
Alarcon’s doctor, a rheumatologist who specializes in treating joint diseases, was the one who nominated her for a Make-a-Wish, providing her with this opportunity to enjoy a family vacation and activities away from hospital rooms.
“I plan on going paddle boarding, surfing, snorkeling, a night luau, [and a] bonfire,” Alarcon said. “At the resort [I also plan on going to the] spa, so we are going to do a mud bath, get our nails done, and a massage.”
Based on the activities Alarcon was interested in, the Make-a-Wish Foundation recommended her a trip to Waikiki, Hawaii, to which she agreed.
“This is where Make-a-Wish chose,” Alarcon said. “It has most of the things I want to do and it’s very beautiful.”
Alarcon is excited for both her trip and to take a break from hospital visits.
“There’s a very huge misconception that Make-a-Wish is for people who are dying, but that’s wrong,” Alarcon said. “It’s for people who have gone through a lot health wise and for them just to have a bright side in a very dark situation, [for] after every rough start comes brighter possibilities, lessons, and experiences.” By Kristen Haga