Cameron Davis, a senior in high school from Los Angeles, California, is 17 years old. She is a Brentwood School honor student dedicated to aiding the city’s homeless population.
Since I was very little, I’ve volunteered to help feed the community of homeless people, Cameron tells us. “I was named Little Miss California when I was nine, and I selected eradicating poverty as my community service focus. Given that Los Angeles has one of the highest rates of homelessness in the country, the humanitarian situation cannot be disregarded.
Cameron initially started helping with My Friends Place by serving food on Skid Row. She has also produced meals and hygiene kits for the Hollywood Food Coalition and Midnight Mission over the years and during the pandemic.
She received the Gold President’s Voluntary Service Award for countless hours of commitment and voluntary work. She enjoyed teaching needy individuals how to cook while growing up in a single-parent home. She frequently discovers her favorite recipes on TikTok.
She learned there were more ways she could give back while working with various organizations. Due to their durability, universal appeal, and ability to be worn throughout the year, jeans were frequently mentioned as necessary. “Every fall, my peers get the chance to shop with their parents for brand-new outfits for school. I wanted to lessen the stigma that homeless kids experience at school. For homeless adolescents in the Los Angeles region, her charity organization, Jeans for Teens, gathers new and gently used denim jeans.
Since beginning Jeans for Teens three years ago, she has gathered hundreds of pairs of jeans; each year, she receives additional donations.
“Now that I have my driver’s license, I can get to more community fridges,” he remarks. Additionally, Cameron provides bottled water and Gatorade to the town’s many communal refrigerators.
Community fridges are refrigerators that a local community or small company manages. Volunteers stocked them with snacks, beverages, and fruits and vegetables that were individually wrapped. Everyone in the neighborhood may take advantage of it for free.
This keeps homeless people hydrated and prevents them from suffering from heat stroke during periods of high heat.
Some people judge people experiencing homelessness and think they’re idle or a bother. But people must understand that homelessness is a complicated problem with many contributing factors, such as poor mental health, a lack of affordable housing, drug misuse, domestic violence, and more.
“I know that I alone am unable to solve this problem,” adds Cameron. However, I think that having a place to live is a basic human right, and if each of us takes one tiny step, we may at the very least change someone’s perspective and give them the courage to keep looking until they do, in the end, find a place they can call home.
