Yesterday marked the beginning of the Virginia Service Coalition's Week in Focus: World Poverty.
The kickoff event in the amphitheater last night featured speeches from Politics Prof. Herman Schwartz and dancing and singing by participating CIOs, which served to generate awareness of the effects of poverty.
"This is a kickoff to get everyone together," VSC President Catherine Jenks said.
After the kickoff there will be four days of events, including movie screenings and additional speeches from University professors.
Jenks said there has already been a lot of response.
"We printed 200 pamphlets for the week and those were gone by one o'clock" on Monday, she said.
According to VSC University Relations Chair Ali Rutherford, the purpose of Week in Focus is to encircle as many CIOs as possible around one uniting issue.
Rutherford said a lot of groups have similar goals but operate independently, sometimes to their detriment.
"Our purpose is to coordinate all those groups," she said.
A lot of groups do community service in the areas of poverty relief and health aid already, which the 15 CIOs signed on to help with the week's events.
The VSC is just a facilitator and is not participating in the fundraising; the coalition is just making sure the groups don't overlap and compete with one another, Rutherford said.
Many of the groups chose to become involved because of specific events like the Pakistani earthquake or poverty specific to a country, but VSC is attempting to bring them all into the fold, Rutherford said.
"We're not trying to focus on one region in the world or another," Rutherford said.
Because poverty is such a general issue, it draws a lot of attention, Jenks said.
"Poverty is a hugely important issue and that's why we're bringing in all these students," Jenks said.
Poverty is so prevalent that it affects a lot of the CIOs programming, ASO member Lara Aboulhosn said.
"Poverty is a way for us all to come together under one cause," Aboulhosn said.
The VSC is planning another Week in Focus on poverty in Charlottesville later in the semester. Rutherford said the plan is to coordinate more groups in helping local charities prepare for the holidays.
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