Since the spring of Freshman year, I’ve spent time at Chester Eastside (CEI). CEI is a small social services not-for-profit based in Chester, Pennsylvania. We offer food and education programs to families from around the area. I began as a tutor in their Out-of-School Time education program. Once a week, I took the SEPTA 109 bus to offer homework assistance: math problems, reading comprehension, and spelling worksheets.
As the summer approached, I met a board member named Lisa. She mentioned the team was seeking help for their new website, so I offered support for the final stretch of the project. Meeting with a mix of board members and staff, I worked on the project for several months to its finality. A few months later, I began helping Rev. Andy, our Executive Director, with grant writing and program development.
My contributions to Chester Eastside have been this mixed bag of ad-hoc support. There’s no grand plan for what I contribute from the outset. Frank Gehry’s architecture speaks to how I envision my time at CEI. The ever-changing needs of the organization – from drafting a memo about a new food program to helping Rev. Andy install our freezer’s condensate pump – become the asymmetrical signposts that guide my work.
When I heard about the Minigrant Program from Campus Compact and The Allstate Foundation, I thought of Chester Eastside and mentioned the opportunity to our staff. I confess, however, that I did not intend to apply until very close to the deadline. I may have been capable of putting forward a facially promising proposal. But it was unclear whether the dollars would offer legitimate value.
Then, our Operations Manager reached out. Born and raised in the City of Chester, Ms. Tiff joined Chester Eastside in March of 2023. Despite facing seemingly insurmountable personal challenges, she has ensured our programs run smoothly, recruited new volunteers from the city, and represented the organization across our many public-facing events.
In an email, Ms. Tiff suggested we could use the Mini-grant help with some upgrades for our clothing closet:
- The Clothing Closet is open to the community every Thursday from 10am - 12:30pm. We distribute personal hygiene items, household goods, clothing (new & used), shoes, diapers, baby items, adult diapers and liners, and Grab - N - Go Lunches. The closet needs to be organized so that the process of bringing things out and putting them away can be made simpler. The money would be used for rolling clothing racks, shoe racks, portable wardrobes, and stackable bins. A student had an accident today and needed a change of clothing. I literally had to hoist myself up over a mountain of bags and boxes to find a pair of new underwear. The student waited in the bathroom for 45 minutes for me to find the items needed. I know it's not much of a major necessity, but it sure would make life easier here.
It sounded like a useful project. We took a look around the clothing closet to see what improvements we could make with the funds. For reference, here’s the main storage area for our clothing closet.
The main storage space for the clothing closet before the project.
From there, we put together an application for the Minigrant. There, I wrote down our observations and suggestions for what we could do: “The Clothing Closet’s physical capacity limitations prevent effective management and storekeeping. For example, blankets meant for distribution contain bedbugs and mice crawl in storage bags. Limitations in space prevent the easy organization of our current items.” Our project would help us purchase new items to reorganize some of the items we had.
Over the next several months, we consulted with Ms. Joan – the volunteer overseeing the Clothes Closet – and other staff. We set a day for a full closet clean-out and began ordering shelves and rolling racks with the Minigrant funds. At the same time, Rev. Andy was in conversation with the vestry of St. Paul’s Church. In short, the church had some unused classrooms on the ground floor. We had inquired about using the space for our programming purposes. Near the end of May, we learned they had approved our proposal to run parts of the clothing closet there.
That decision quickly changed the trajectory of our plan. With this space available, our guests could enter through a separate entrance. The full clothing closet operations would happen in one place – as opposed to moving all our supplies each time to an open space – which dramatically increased our operational efficiency. After we ordered our materials, we set up a day for volunteers to help unpack and set up the clothing closet.
An inside look at our new space on the ground floor.
Here’s the other side of the room. We set up the moveable wardrobes we purchased – where we plan to hang clothing – but we are still putting in the clothing.
Much of the clothing closet’s work continues as we move into the new space – a breakthrough we did not anticipate from the start of the project. As such, we continue to evolve the process by which our guests can access our items. Nevertheless, we made a significant step forward with the overhaul of the clothing closet.
On behalf of Chester Eastside, I would like to thank the Allstate Foundation for the opportunity to advance the clothing closet!