Experiment by Emily Mouch

I.               Title: Homeless Person Observation

II.             Materials Needed

a.     Homeless people

b.     Homeless shelter

c.      Questionable beef stew

d.     Paper plates

e.     Plastic forks and spoon

f.      Watered-down punch

III.           Procedure

a.     Divide into groups of three to four students

b.     Drive to Over the Rhine located in Cincinnati, Ohio

c.      Park

d.     Serve food

e.     Clean tables

f.      Talk with homeless people

g.     Observe their interactions

IV.            Hypothesis

a.     I claim that the Drop Inn Center in Cincinnati will be an eye-opening and rewarding experiment that will allow insight into the similarities that exist between homeless people and those people with homes.  Furthermore, I expect that homeless shelter to be a sad place filled with an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness.

V.              Conclusion

a.     After careful observation at the Drop Inn center, only fifty-percent of my hypothesis remains correct. The experience was in fact eye opening and incredibly rewarding for it showed that humanity remains intact in the inhumanity of homelessness. However, the remainder portion of my hypothesis, the lack of hope within the Drop Inn Center, is far from correct. There existed an overwhelming sense of hope, family, and love.  This is far from what I expected to observe in my experiment. The walls were painted orange, blue, green, and pink – painted to cover the bleak black and grey that is associated with homeless. Yet, it was not the vibrant color of the walls that grabbed my attention, but the colorful personalities that existed on the faces of the Drop Inn residents.