In light of the ongoing pandemic, Campolindo’s Social Activism and Awareness club hosted a drive for the Women’s Daytime Drop-in Center in Oakland for 1 week starting January 8.

Club co-president sophomore Katie Pflieger said, “The center is an amazing place for women and children to go and get help at any time. Especially during this pandemic, families, and shelters are in need of household supplies more than ever.”

When contacted, the drop-in center said that they were in need of cleaning supplies, menstrual products, toilet paper, wet wipes, deodorant, and other items. The club then set up a donation box on campus.

While some of these items may seem mundane, such necessities are in great demand. With the pandemic and all of its social and economic effects, many people have suffered hardships making these necessary items a scarcity.

“The pandemic has negatively impacted mass amounts of people. Domestic violence rates have increased and demands in shelters have also dramatically increased,” said co-president sophomore Fatima Taymuree. “We wanted to raise awareness and donations for this important cause.”

While the club had originally hoped to visit shelters and food banks to volunteer directly this year, COVID-19 restrictions forced them to explore new avenues.

Plieger said, “We had a lot of plans for this year, including going to shelters and food banks to help out directly, but unfortunately due to COVID most of those plans didn’t work out. So instead we reached out to shelters in the area needing supplies and found the Women’s Daytime Drop-in Center in Oakland.”

Although the donation drive has ended, the club is pleased with the drive’s turnout. Pflieger said, “We are super grateful to everyone who donated and are definitely planning on doing something like this again in the future! We collected a great variety of items and we’re really happy that so many people went out of their way to drop stuff off.”

“We started this club because we thought it would really add something to Campo: we wanted to create a safe place where anyone can come and discuss current events and we wanted to work together to positively impact our community,” said Pflieger.