Students and faculty return from relief efforts with stories, lessons learned

Photo by Cara Salmon

Two group members stretch out during a break from working.

Despite the devastation encountered by the EMU students aiding in the Gulf region hurricane relief, they found that "the underlying theme was hope."

The group included senior nursing students Emily Dye, Kara Glick, Monica Hensley, Hadley Jenner, Amanda Maust, Cara Salmon, Aaron Schmucker, and Carla Simmons-Wulin, along with nursing faculty members Sue Klassen and Don Tyson. They were in the region for two weeks to assist the Red Cross in their relief efforts.

They went first as a whole group to the Red Cross orientation center in Montgomery, Ala., where they waited for two days to receive their placements. The delay, the group said, was due to the fact that they were a large group, and they were not licensed nurses, being only students. Maust described the waiting period as stressful, "because we were so excited to get down there and serve and work." The EMU group was not alone in waiting, though--they talked to people who had waited four to five days to be placed.

After the two days the team was split into two groups; one was sent to Brookhaven, Miss., and the other to McComb, Miss. In both towns, the teams worked in health service centers from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., processing over 400 people each day. The most common health problems that they saw were diabetes and hypertension.

The EMU teams took one day in the middle of their service to go down to the Biloxi and Gulfport areas, some of the areas hit hardest by Hurricane Katrina. There they saw the complete desolation the storm had wrought. One student described the sight as very "sobering." Their visit to that area gave them a new perspective, they said, because it was there that "when people said they'd lost everything, you knew what it meant." The group saw how high the water had risen, noticing watermarks 15 feet high on some trees. The devastation continued for miles. Victims in the area spoke of winds up to 145 miles per hour; the group saw oak trees and their entire root systems ripped out of the ground.

The group faced a few challenges during their trip. One of the struggles was working with the other volunteers and adjusting to their different personality types. The teams also said that available resources changed daily. For example, one day FEMA would offer a 30-day supply of medication, and then the next day it would not be available. This left the team with somewhat of a helpless feeling, not knowing what supplies they would have to give out. Some of the group felt guilty at having the comforts of home--showers, beds, three decent meals each day--when the people they were serving had lost everything.

The teams were housed in places where evacuees were staying, so often they would spend their evenings talking with victims and listening to their thoughts and stories. They heard powerful stories, such as when Maust was talking with one man whom she described as a "big white man with tattoos," and as he was talking he began to cry. He was embarrassed by this and put on his sunglasses for the rest of the conversation. Another student shared the story of a man staying at the same hotel that the Montgomery students were staying. He had been working with a clean-up crew because he had nowhere else to go. The man had lost his identification and Social Security card, and had been robbed twice. After working with the crew for a few weeks, he couldn't handle the situation anymore, but didn't know what to do or where to go.

There was much sadness and destruction witnessed throughout the trip, but the EMU group also noticed the hope on the faces of the victims. Many of those that went shared that they received words of thanks such as "God bless you." Despite the loss, they found some people to be upbeat and hopeful.

The group went down to serve, but also came back having learned things. Many felt that both their clinical and teaching skills had improved. They learned to be thankful for the small things many people take for granted, such as having a grocery store to go to, or a shower to use each day. Entire towns were wiped out by the storm, and so the people they encountered had absolutely nothing. There was a general feeling within the group of being both thankful and guilty for being able to come back to the comforts enjoyed at home.

Some said it was an experience just to be in the Deep South, but that with the devastation caused by the hurricane they didn't even feel like they were still in the United States at times. This trip, for both the nursing students and faculty, was an experience that one student described as making them "better human beings."