MEET THE TEAM

Kanika Chaudhary is a third year business administration student concentrating in accounting and information systems. Kanika is an Woods Humane Society Volunteer, Vice President of Outreach for Cal Poly's Women in Business Administration, and the current Cal Poly CalCPA Ambassador. She loves to read and run in her free time.

Milena Triana is a fourth year political science major with a marketing minor. She is really into traveling and learning more about cultures. She loves visiting her family in Argentina every christmas and exploring new countries.

Ryan Anderson is a third year City and Regional Planning Major and is also minoring in sustainable environments. He grew up in Redwood City, California before coming to Cal Poly. The hands on projects he's worked on in his major classes as well as his experience interning for a local government have shown him how change can gradually be started and implemented in a city. He believes that giving the homeless the tools and resources to be self-sufficient is the best solution to homelessness in San Luis Obispo.

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Angie is a third year

sociology major with a concentration in Criminal Justice for Minors. She volunteers at local schools in Paso Robles where the focuses on young girls; She hopes to build up the self esteem of these young girls and help them find their inner worth so they can become strong adult leaders. She hopes to make others aware of our communities needs because they are our future leaders.

This team was formed in the PSC 391- Appropriate Technology for the World's People: Development class at Cal Poly SLO. Click on the link below to see a objective of the class as well as the different projects that other students are participating in!

Class Website

About

Community

The Problem:

San Luis Obsipo County's homeless count has increased by almost one third since the last census. There are approximately 1,483 homeless people in 2019, an increase from 1,125 counted in 2017. SLO is trying to develop more homeless shelters and housing facilities since there are only two permanent homeless shelters in the county so far. Job loss, alcohol or drug use, and eviction due to high rent were the top three reasons for being homeless. Like the preceding research group for this project, we believe that there are numerous programs and alternative solutions to combatting the homeless in SLO that most people are not aware of. Our project serves to further the education of the public about the recent shift in homelessness and provide additional solutions and opportunities that are recently developing.

SUMMARY OF OUR IMPACT: Our goal was to collect more information and create a new interactive, informative, and appealing website that people are more inclined to share via social media. Building off of last year's group, we incorporated their flyer and research on available resources into our site as a printable document (since having a tangible guide may help those who do not have access the web 24/7). Going along the last group's advice, we worked with TMHA to come up with a way Cal Poly students can get more hands on experience with aiding the homeless - the Landscaping Project. We also built new social media accounts (Gmail, Facebook, and Instagram), added new ways for students to help/ get involved, and finally interviewed three homeless cases to gain a better understanding of the homeless population.

TIPS FOR THE FUTURE CLASS: 1) Build up from this website/ social media accounts instead of creating new ones. We have created master email, instagram, and facebook accounts under one name that can be passed to future groups.

2) Focus on a more specialized topic or research idea. Attached below is a reference for potential takes on this project.

FUTURE PROJECTS