Anti-Poverty Service Learning Resources

The UNO Service Learning Academy (SLA), in partnership with AmeriCorps and the Campus Compact AmeriCorps VISTA Program, has had the opportunity to collaborate with AmeriCorps members to recognize the community’s most pressing challenges and advance local solutions to work towards eradicating poverty. Out of this partnership, the SLA is able to provide a space for project materials and resources specifically curated for anti-poverty service learning. The resources found here are just the beginning, and we hope to continue to grow the inventory with anti-poverty research, class projects, and resources contributed by our service learning partners. Have your own anti-poverty materials you wish to share? Send us your materials via email at unosla@unomaha.edu and include “Anti-Poverty Service Learning Resources” as your email subject line. For more information on the SLA’s anti-poverty initiative, visit our website at https://www.unomaha.edu/service-learning-academy/priority-areas/anti-poverty-initiative.php

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5 Factors That Promote Resilience

Alison Block

This website includes a handout and information developed by psychologist Dr. Alison Block about five factors that promote resilience.
Talk Poverty

Center for American Progress

Talk Poverty is a website that provides current events related to poverty, breaks down poverty data, and explains the effects of poverty in our everyday lives.
Social & Emotional Learning Strengths Builder Method

Forum for Youth Investment

This website explains how the Social & Emotional Learning (SEL) Strengths Builder Method can be used to assess how service learning projects support the development of students' SEL. The website includes free resources that guide educators through the SEL Strengths Builder Method and explains how each step can be incorporated in your project.
Service Learning Mindset: Cultural Humility And Asset-Based Community Engagement

Allegra Hardin and UNO Service Learning Academy

This video explores what it means to have a service learning mindset by defining cultural humility and asset-based community engagement. (Video length: less than 5 minutes)
Learning To Give

Learning To Give

Learning To Give is a website that hosts K-12 service learning lesson plans and activities that educators can use in their own classrooms. This website allows educators to search by service learning topic, class subject, or other keywords to find materials to support their service learning projects.
Power Flower

Natalie A. Mello and The Forum on Education Abroad

The Power Flower activity helps students recognize their intersectional identities and their proximity to social identities that hold power and privilege.
Homelessness Learning Hub

Canadian Observatory on Homelessness

The Homelessness Learning Hub is a website that hosts free toolkits, self-paced lessons, and classroom activities related to homelessness and oppression. This website also includes a search tool to look for specific keywords and topics related to homelessness.
Surviving An Unlivable Wage

CBS News

This documentary from CBS News explores the reality of living as a tipped worker in the restaurant industry. In spite of working with food every day, tipped workers struggle with food insecurity in their personal lives. (Video length: less than 30 minutes)
Introduction To Understanding Poverty

Allegra Hardin

These brief handouts provide background and context to understanding poverty for different key audiences. The main handout (which can be downloaded by selecting the main title) is tailored toward P-12 Teachers and Administrators, while the supplemental handouts indicate their specific intended audiences in their titles. All together there are five handouts, one for each target audience listed below.
- P-12 Teachers & Administrators
- Elementary Teachers & Students
- High School/Middle School Teachers & Students
- UNO Faculty & Students
- Community Partners
Examining the Black-white Wealth Gap

Kriston McIntosh, Emily Moss, Ryan Nunn, and Jay Shambaugh

This Brookings Institute article explores the racial wealth gap in the United States.
Working Woman Testifies About Reality of Poverty In The U.S.

NowThis News

This video from NowThis News features organizer Amy Jo Hutchinson testifying to Congress about her lived experiences with poverty in the U.S. Through her testimony, she explains just how expensive poverty is in the U.S. (Video length: less than 5 minutes)
Opportunity Index

The Forum For Youth Investment, Child Trends, and Opportunity Nation

This website provides an interactive map with data about local economies, education, community health, and civic life to show what opportunity looks like in different parts of the United States.
WE Schools

WE Schools

WE Schools is a program that offers K-12 educators free service learning resources focused on hunger, poverty, and education inequality. By registering on the website for free, educators can search through resources by service learning topic, classroom subject, and grade level.
Service-Learning Series: Toolkit For Preparing Students

Carolina Center for Public Service

This toolkit is for educators about preparing both themselves and their students for service learning projects. From social justice to community-based teaching to power and privilege, this toolkit includes contextual information and practical considerations when planning service learning projects.
How America Created Its Shameful Wealth Gap | Inequality Media

Solana Rice, Robert Reich, and Inequality Media

In this Inequality Media video, Co-Founder of Liberation in a Generation Solana Rice explains how a combination of institutional racism & white supremacy created America's racial wealth gap. (Video length: less than 7 minutes)
Disrupting Food Insecurity

Urban Institute

This interactive dashboard created by the Urban Institute provides information about food insecurity levels, related risk factors, and local challenges faced by counties across the United States.
Youth Service America Knowledge Center

Youth Service America

The Youth Service America Knowledge Center is a website focused on engaging children in meaningful service learning. This website hosts free tools and guides for educators to use in their own service learning projects.
Disability & Poverty in America

Kathleen Brannigan and National Disability Institute

This video from the National Disability Institute explains how disability and poverty create barriers to employment, education, and economic stability. (Video length: less than 3 minutes)
Social Determinants of Health - An Introduction

Let's Learn Public Health and Ranil Appuhamy

This video from Let's Learn Public Health provides introductory information about the social determinants of health model and how it relates to socioeconomic status. (Video length: less than 7 minutes)
13 Lessons About Poverty

AmeriCorps and Stephen Pimpare

In this video, author Stephen Pimpare explains 13 lessons about poverty, ranging from the commonality of poverty to policies that address it. (Video length: 15 minutes)
The Story We Tell About Poverty Isn't True

Mia Birdsong and TED Conferences

This TED Talk dispels many ill-conceived notions about people in poverty. Using an asset-based lens, Mia Birdsong uses anecdotes about different individuals who have used their strengths in spite of their poverty. She asks people to change their narrative about marginalized communities and individuals in poverty.
Why Disability And Poverty Still Go Hand In Hand 25 Years After Landmark Law

Pam Fessler and National Public Radio

This NPR article and radio clip explores why disability and poverty are commonly connected even after 25 years of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
How Poverty Is Measured In The United States

AmeriCorps

This AmeriCorps video explores how poverty is measured in the United States and how the measurement can fall short of providing resources for people who need it. (Video length: less than 3 minutes)
CBK Associates Resources

CBK Associates and Cathryn Berger Kaye

CBK Associates is a website featuring free service learning curriculum, student guides, and resources to assist in developing your own service learning project.
Brené Brown on Empathy

Royal Society for Arts (RSA), Brené Brown, Katy Davis, Abi Stephenson, and Al Francis-Sears

In this video, Brené Brown explains the difference between sympathy and empathy. She shares that the only way to make a true empathetic connection is through vulnerability. (Video length: less than 3 minutes)