Over the course of her volunteer experience with LIFT, Liz Powers went above and beyond to serve her clients and quickly distinguished herself as a leader among her fellow volunteers. She served as a Student Director and traveled with three fellow LIFT-Cambridge volunteers to Texas to share their Clinton Global Initiative University proposal to expand mental health support for Cambridge residents with hundreds of other college students and global leaders. Liz organized LIFT-Cambridge’s homelessness awareness demonstrations at Harvard University during two National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Weeks.
She also led efforts to create the LIFT-Boston Bike Project, an ongoing project that addressed what she saw recurring need among LIFT for affordable transportation that was not provided by the MBTA. She says, “I had clients who were unable to access existing social services like food pantries or go to job interviews because they couldn’t afford to take the T. In order to fill this gap, I created the Bike Project to refurbish abandoned bikes.” She recruited several community partners and volunteers to donate and refurbish bicycles, then gave the bicycles, along with helmets, locks, and a mandatory bike safety course, to LIFT clients. To date the LIFT-Boston Bike Project has provided more than 60 Cambridge residents with affordable, sustainable transportation and hosted its most recent distribution event on the steps of Cambridge City Hall with the mayor.
Read articles from The Cambridge Chronicle and The Boston Globe on the LIFT-Boston Bike Project.
Learn more about the project and how to get involved at www.liftbikeproject.blogspot.com
For three years, Liz was also the coordinator for LIFT’s “Faces of Cambridge” photo gallery, where LIFT clients were given disposable cameras to capture the spirit of the city of Cambridge. Volunteers and amateur photographers in the community also contributed photos to a gallery exhibition during Harvard’s Arts First week. Liz recalls the powerful experience of standing next to one of her clients, who was beaming with pride that her photos were on display to the public; she says it was a significant influence in choosing to pursue her next career move.
Liz says, “During my time at LIFT, at the end of each client meeting, I wrote notes about the services that I provided and the next steps we would take together. After almost every client meeting, I marked “listening and support” as a service provided. To be honest, when I first began volunteering I did not realize that “listening and support” was arguably the most important service that I could provide my clients. Many of my clients do not have any friends and family offering them support and encouragement. Many feel isolated and alone. Many do not feel part of any community. For the past few years I have been thinking about how, in addition to providing one-on-one service, I could help clients fight these feelings of isolation. I have been thinking about how to design a program that could help create a sense of community for some of the countless lonely individuals that I have met with.”
The 2010 Harvard graduate is currently spending the year working on a project with the Pforzheimer Foundation Public Service Fellowship entitled City Heart to develop an arts curriculum for low-income individuals and families. Modeled loosely after a sewing collective she participated in, Liz has developed partnerships with local art suppliers and art colleges to help support the program, which she hopes will provide low-income Cambridge residents, among them many LIFT clients, a fun, therapeutic outlet and a free option to be a part of a community.
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Read event announcements from The Boston Globe for City Heart's premiere art show.
Watch video from The Boston Globe about City Heart:
