A college professor challenged students to create a product that filled “actual needs.” Veronica Scott didn’t know it at the time, but that assignment was going to change her life and the life of many others. Working directly with homeless people in Detroit, Veronica began creating prototypes of a coat that would double as a sleeping bag at night.
http://www.empowermentplan.org/ (please watch the video here)
One day, however, a lady came out of a homeless shelter, screaming at Veronica, “We don’t need a coat. A coat is pointless. We need jobs.” After being startled and probably a little offended, Veronica had the “a-ha” moment.
Veronica Scott is now the founder and CEO of The Empowerment Plan. She hires homeless individuals to make this coat/sleeping bag for other homeless individuals. Her employees get job training, a decent wage and whatever else she can provide to get each individual back on their feet. Veronica provides hope and encouragement to individuals who are in dire need of such commodities. She empowers people with a plausible plan to get their life back!
Joe’s Perspective: I am not sure it gets any more innovative & inspiring than this. There are 50,000 homeless individuals in Detroit alone. Can you imagine how cold it gets for these individuals? Not only has Veronica designed a product that can save lives, but she is employing the very people to manufacture this product who need it most. She then secures funding from companies, foundations and individuals to purchase the coats for homeless people. Bravo! It’s this kind of out-of-the-box thinking that can change the world. By the way, Veronica is only 24 years old.
Your Turn: Please place your comments below, (2) like and share our Facebook page (character development & leadership) or (3) tweet to @CDandLeadership)
1. Does this inspire you? Can you begin to think of the contributions you can make to society?
2. Challenge: Do you think your class/school could raise enough money to provide 1 coat for a homeless person? The cost for each coat is $100. If so, the website is pasted above.
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i would help the homeless people cause that lady was wrong for what she did.
1. yes, to help those in need
2. yes
I can contribute to helping less people die by donating my old clothes to Goodwill and Salvation Army.
1, yes i would help i could help donating food and clothes , along with blankets and higen produces.
1. Does this inspire you? Yes.Can you begin to think of the contributions you can make to society?I can donate to people or make lunches for them.
2. Challenge: Do you think your class/school could raise enough money to provide 1 coat for a homeless person? Yes.The cost for each coat is $100. If so, the website is pasted above.
Yes,this story inspires me.Yes,I can begin to think of ways I can contribute to society by donating to charities and cleaning up the trash that I see when I walk around my neighborhood.
2.Yes,I do think my class could raise enough money for a coat.
1. Yes, this story inspires me. Yes. I can begin to think of ways I can contribute to society by donating to those less fortunate than me or helping them in another way.
2. Yes, I do think my school can raise enough money to provide a coat for a homeless person.
1. yes it inspires me to help all people because everyone is equal.
2.yes because i know there are people who like to help give money for people who need help.
1. Yes, it does inspire me. Yes, some contributes I can make is that I can make my own little inventions for the homeless and give them jobs.
2. Yes, because I know their is enough kindness in their hearts to give money for the coat.
1.This does inspire me and I would like to help.
2.I think we should raise $100 for everyone to have a coat.
Yes,this story inspires me.Yes,I can begin to think of ways I can contribute to society by donating to charities and cleaning up the trash that I see when I walk around my neighborhood.
2.Yes,I do think my class could raise enough money for a coat.
Yes this story does inspire me and I would like to help the people around our area.
I believe our class can raise money for a coat.
1. Yes, this does inspire me I could contribute in my community by giving away the clothes that my family and I don’t use .
2. I do believe my school could raise that money.
I feel as though that this does inspire me. I can contribute to my community by helping and giving gifts to children at the hospital. I do not think that my school could provide the resources for a coat.
This story is very inspiring, it makes me want to make a change like this for communities similar to hers.
1. Yes this inspires me and I can help by doing little tasks for the people that are less fortunate.
I would love to help people and what all they need to do.
I love helping people that are in need of food and drink etc.
Yes,this story inspires me.Yes,I can begin to think of ways I can contribute to society by donating to charities and cleaning up the trash that I see when I walk around my neighborhood.
2.Yes,I do think my class could raise enough money for a coat.
I love helping people.
1. Does this inspire you? Yes.Can you begin to think of the contributions you can make to society?I can donate to people or make lunches for them.
2. Challenge: Do you think your class/school could raise enough money to provide 1 coat for a homeless person? Yes.The cost for each coat is $100. If so, the website is pasted above.
I can contribute to helping less people die by donating my old clothes to Goodwill and Salvation Army.
1. This dose inspire me I think that a lot of people think about what they can do but it takes somone special to act on thier ideas. We can all do service to other it may not be to the homeless but it could be somone as simple as our peers.
2. I think that we could raise enought money to buy a few coats.
1. Yes this inspires me because you have to help those homeless peoples
2. Yes
1.) it honestly does inspire me but some people take that out of proportion. i also feel that like we all get the same possibility to get a job and even better ourselves.
Why would i help society humans are bad. I wanna help the earth
buy them something cheap just know im not donating nothing
1. It inspires me. People also all have opportunities to better themselves.
This story is very inspiring, it makes me want to make a change like this for communities similar to hers.
I think schools should raise money to provide a coat for the homeless because it is hard for them to survive in harsh weather
1. Yes, This Did Inspire Me. One contributions by giving some of the people a opportunity to make some easy money.
2. Yes, i dont think my school/class could raise enough money to buy a coat.
i think they should help because if they was in that situation they would want somebody to help them and there homeless they cant say oh im finna go by me a coat they barley can even get them some food but i think they should get him the coat
Yes. I can contribute to society by helping others succeed, which creates more opportunity.
I think our school could actually raise money for a couple of the coats, but it would be smarter to find a cheaper alternative to get more out of the money.
1.) Yes, because I would want to save others in need of help.
2.) Yes, I believe my school can raise money for a coat.
1.) Yes, because I would want to help people in need.
2.) Yes, I believe my school can save up the money for a coat.
1) yes because i would like to help others in need.
2) yes i believe that my school could save up money to provide these coats
1.Yes it does inspire me because I don’t mind save and helping each others
2. Yes because it helping somebody
1. This does inspire me.
2. Yes I think my school could.
1. Does this inspire you? Can you begin to think of the contributions you can make to society?
Yes.
2. Challenge: Do you think your class/school could raise enough money to provide 1 coat for a homeless person? The cost for each coat is $100. If so, the website is pasted above.
I don’t know if the principal would allow it.
1. I would love to help those in need
2. yes
this inspires me to help the homeless because if I saw a homeless I would help them and give them supplies
This does inspire me because there is a person in Detriot which was a very poor city back then but she is there to provide coats and Jobs to the homeless but they need to do Job training first.
1.Yes this does inspire me and I could think of helping family who need help.
2. Yes I think we could because leadership class is teaching us to work together.
Yes,this story inspires me.Yes,I can begin to think of ways I can contribute to society by donating to charities and cleaning up the trash that I see when I walk around my neighborhood.
2.Yes,I do think my class could raise enough money
i would help the homeless because they need a job and they need to get back on there feet
Yes, this does inspire because she proved that person wrong and it helped many people with jobs and keep them warm. I do think our class could raise that amount of money.
1. I’ve heard about this story before and yes it does inspire me. It makes me think I can help our society in such a simple way at a young age. I used to help out at soup kitchens and other things like that but Veronica demonstrates how I could do bigger things.
2. I do believe our school could raise enough for one probably even more than one coat.
This is a very inspiring story, it just shows that people do continue to care and change the world. It just reminds you that regardless of your age, you can still make a difference. It’s a very kind act to do for those who need it.
this story inspires people to do good and to continue to care for others,
Brianna’s actions are appreciated, and she understands how these people feel because she was in similar positions. She is also helping all of these people in the long run and setting them on the right track.
This story inspires you to do good and it shows that people do care and those people who constantly do things like this should be appreciated.
Yes, making a gift basket for younger kids during the holidays could help a lot of people and not just the kids.
This inspires me to help people and do what’s right for just their appreciation in return. It is an inspiration of what can happen when somebody puts their effort into something that isn’t for them.
This inspires me to help people and do what’s right for just their appreciation in return. It is an inspiration of what can happen when somebody puts their effort into something that isn’t for them. Nice people need to show more help and the people being helped should show appreciation towards those people.
yes it dose i should help people more
yes vary esily
This shows appretiation because people help
This inspires me to help people and do what’s right for just their appreciation in return.
1.This does inspirer me to do something for my community. Something I could do for my society is raise money for the homeless shelter or donate stuff to the home shelter.
2. I think that my class could raise $100 for a coat if we worked together.
There is gratitude because she is helping the homeless even when she does not have to. She is also changing people’s lives by getting them jobs to make those coats.
1. Does this inspire you? Can you begin to think of the contributions you can make to society?
This does inspire me but i would have no idea how to contribute to society.
2. Challenge: Do you think your class/school could raise enough money to provide 1 coat for a homeless person? The cost for each coat is $100. If so, the website is pasted above.
No I do not because we already have a fundraiser we are doing.
yes and i thing i could give stuff to the homeless
yes I thnk my class could
She is a very inspiring and kind person who help the people who needed it most. After having that encounter and idea, she created this system which gave even more help and changed many lives for the better.
Yes and I think I can do something to help homeless people.
I think our school can get money for one coat for a homeless person.
This is a post on graditude because it makes people who have homes grateful and want to help and it lets homeless people grateful aswell
This is a post on graditude because it makes people who have homes grateful and want to help and it lets homeless people grateful aswell and it makes everyone feel better about themselves too
This story is very inspirational and inspires me to think about the contributions I can make to society. I think my class could definitely raise enough money for one of these coats if we did enough fundraising. This story shows the importance of gratitude because readers can understand how to be thankful for what they have, and those who are in need of the coats are probably thankful when they get them.
This encourages me to help and I think my class would be able to make $100 to give a person a coat.
This story does inspire me to do small acts to help out other people who need it, such as doing charity, improving our community, and applying for jobs.
I do think my class or school could raise enough money for a coat or multiple. Knowing that donated resources will directly help homeless people will definitely get more attention and have more people donate.
This story can remind you to help people in those situations, and to help people out in general. I think that this community could definitely make a change to improve people’s lives.
q1. Yes, this sounds like a great concept and idea for such a good cause; helping people less fortunate than you. And reminds me to do more for people less fortunate, it also sounds like a good lesson to learn from and act on at random times.
q2. I think its possible. And could raise awareness in the community.
This story inspires me because everyone is trying to help the homeless.
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