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In 15 minutes, Dilon Petersen, a nursing student at UNLV, went from homeless to finding housing, visiting social services and pawning items at the pawnshop, all while taking care of his 1 year old child as a single mother.
Those 15 minutes represented a full week in the UNLV Poverty Simulation, an interprofessional training exercise involving 80 students from Feeding with milk, Medication, and Dental Medicine. Returning after a one-year hiatus, the simulation is an empathy-building tool that helps students like Petersen understand the challenges of poverty as well as the resources and barriers associated with community service.
Real life circumstances
The School of Nursing has been hosting the Poverty Simulation since 2009 (with the accession of Dentistry in 2017 and Kirk Kerkorian School Medicine in 2019). Minnie Wood, director of clinical and community nursing partnerships, says the immersive experience helps contextualize health services in a simulated month.
While the situations may apply during times of a pandemic, Wood says the simulation is based on national statistics and general circumstances.
“It’s about replicating the real conditions that exist in our society,” she says.
Students from each health school are randomly assigned to a family based on prefabricated kits, complete with name badges and bags that share their specific roles. Students play struggling families above, near or below the poverty line. They perform important activities, such as going to work or school, in four 15-minute increments. These conditions are made worse by paying rent, medical bills and other living expenses. Other participants represent community organizations such as banks, grocery stores, daycares and police services.
Not all routines are the same. While one person is going to work, another is looking for a job. There are parents who drop their children off at daycare, while other parents wonder what to do with their children because they cannot afford it when time is running out.
“You will literally see students looking for their homes, realizing they don’t have one and then having to figure out [out] where do we have to [they] go. “says Jennifer Young, director of community engagement at the Kerkorian School of Medicine.” They go to the homeless shelter, then navigate through social services, social workers and the real estate agent. ”
Alicia Carlos, first year dental student, says: “This was my first simulation of poverty, and it was maximum stress, but it helped me realize how close people are living to the poverty line. are faced every day. One of the biggest hurdles was trying to find a place – it was never easy because there were so many factors to consider.
When life dies script
Scripts guide the simulation with rules for each role. Teachers and staff keep student scripts until the day of the simulation. “We don’t want them planning,” says Wood. “We just want them to come in and experience it.”
In the general settings there is room for improvisation. Volunteers can decide how to involve students, for example by making it more difficult for them. “We’re not an agency, we’re a business,” the pawnshop owner tells a student trying to pawn her old television.
A real estate agent, for example, “forgets” to give a family a receipt for their week’s rent. This angers tenants when faced with an eviction without proof of payment of their rent. Wood explains, “It’s an interesting learning experience because the students are like, ‘It’s bullshit, I paid my rent,’ and we say, ‘It’s happening all over the country with predatory landlords. – that people do not have this right to housing and people pay in cash. If they lose a receipt, they’re screwed.
Simulation animators will step in with reminders or random events (raffle cards) to add more obstacles, such as surprise emergency surgery. Other times, teachers remind students that they haven’t done groceries for a whole week or that they accidentally left their children at home. Students should judge which tasks to focus on and which to neglect. “When you’re in this situation,” says Wood, “where is my medical, health and dental care on my priority list? Usually it is [lower] because you’re just trying to survive.
Not for fun
The simulation’s performances, scripts and ad-libbing make the exercise seem like a giant skit, but professors and staff stress that it is not a game. it’s a simulation, it’s real people’s lives, ”says Young. “Poverty is simply a set of circumstances. I think especially for this state and the city, we’ve seen ups and downs, and I think no one is immune.
From deportation to prison to the juvenile room, there are consequences in the simulation as in real life. There are also instances where students could remember their own childhood under comparable conditions. Nursing student Zaria Nobles, who grew up in a similar situation, noted that her personal experience had helped her maneuver in the various simulation departments, but she admits it was eye-opening anyway.
“It made me see at the time that this was what I had to do,” says Nobles. “Now I realize that we have overcome this and that I can do what I need. “
Students who are anxious about the simulation may request to be transferred to other roles in the community.
Individual causes versus societal causes
Faculty, staff, and students debrief after the simulation is over. There are more obvious takeaways about how much work it takes to survive when you have limited resources, but students also saw first-hand the problem of not having reliable transportation; wait for medical appointments; abundant paperwork; and how to balance their hierarchy of needs.
Young hopes to raise awareness that it is not always the fault of someone living in poverty; there are systemic factors that play a role.
“As a society, we have a thought process of ‘Pull your boots’, that we are all in control of our destiny, and if you don’t thrive, it’s because you’re missing out in a way. or another, ”she explains. . “I think over the last year and a half, with social unrest, looking at equity in health, race and wealth, our society has a better understanding of the structural differences that explain why certain groups and demographics, in general, can progress or be financially successful. “
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