Community-based Team Project Reflections

Melissa, Brendan and Carlos

What?
La Línea es una línea de apoyo para inmigrantes en lachampaign-urbana comunidad. Desde cuando empezó su misión ha cambiado un poco.Al principio La Línea fue dirigido hacia inmigrantes hispanos, pero hemosdescubierto que hay muchos inmigrantes en nuestra comunidad que necesitanapoyo, no solamente hispanos. Por eso La Línea ha decidido ampliar su alcancepara ayudar a más gente. El problema que tiene La Línea es que mucha gente nosabe de nosotros y por eso nuestro grupo quiere hacer un video para informar a másgente de lo que hace La Línea. Nuestrovideo será muy corto y casi como un comercial para La Línea.
--Melissa

So what?
La Línea Latina is a helpline that connects people,specifically immigrants, with contacts and resources within the community. Itis also dedicated to social justice. La Línea is a collaboration betweenUniversity of Illinois students and the University YMCA with the goal ofbridging the gap between the Latino community in Champaign and communityservices. Clients can call La Línea any day or time and their volunteers willevaluate the situation and either serve as representatives for the client orseek out information that can be helpful, making use of external resources. La Línea is very important for the Latino community inChampaign because although there are many support services within thecommunity, immigrants often do not use them due to lack of knowledge aboutthem, lack of trust, or not having the proper connections to utilize them. Thisorganization provides immigrants with knowledgeable representatives that theycan trust who will do whatever is necessary to make sure that their situationreceives the attention and resources that it requires.
--Brendan

Now what?
With the video that we made, we have informed many people out there that they are not alone. There is help out there for them, and I think we have achieved our goal of informing them. La Línea helps many different people without any if's or but's and this has really showed us a lot. We have learned to lend a helping hand no matter what it is. Even if we cannot personally help them, there are my out there than can. If we at least point them in the right direction we have helped. Within Champaign we have spread the word of what La Línea is, and our next goal is to let others in other cities know about it, too. Hopefully La Línea can grow and help many others like they do here. I am positive that others can learn just as much as we did from this experience.
--Carlos

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