Morgan Linsy

It was another fantastic day of move-in for new and returning Tigers to Rawls and Smith Hall. While many students came nervous, it was a pleasure to encourage them and suggest activities on campus to kick-off the start of another great academic year. As a grad student myself, and alumni of the University of Memphis, what Housing and Residence Life and Student Affairs are doing by improving the student experience, even down to move-in, is a great way to welcome new Tigers to their new homes.

Coming back and serving as a new grad student, and still having an opportunity to provide assistance to Tigers starting their journey is truly rewarding. I'm grateful to Weeks of Welcome, Housing and Residence Life, and Student Involvement for allowing Warm Welcome to be an all-hands-on deck experience that the students will remember.

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to serve with the Mid South Food Bank. While there were many areas in which they provide services, the service we completed on this particular day was to pack bags and fill boxes with menstrual products for women and girls. Located in a more poverty-stricken area of the Memphis Community, the core volunteers at Mid South Food Bank were more than ecstatic to have had so many volunteers and accomplish so many projects in one day. As a part of this service, we all worked in teams at our individual bins to pack as many bags as we could. As time went along, it was evident that working in pairs would be faster to supply all the bags with their respective contents. My partner was Jayla Kyle, and as two women packing menstrual supplies, it provided a gateway for enriching conversation about how much menstrual cycles affect a woman's life long-term and short-term. I think this service impacted me personally because I was able to witness just how much thought and time goes into making sure you have the right sizes and types of products, whether it be liner, pads or tampons. Trying to ensure each bag had a diverse array of contents to fit the needs of someone I've never met reassured me of the sense of compassion and care we can have for others, often not intentionally. Something else I took away from this service was working on my patience. Throughout the service, there were times when production got low or that we were receiving a high volume of bags from the other bin. This because frustrating as me and my partner often were trying to pay for attention to the types of product and size to ensure a patient got a wealthy array of products and our adjacent partner, who were of the male gender, were not necessarily knowledge on the impact a reduction in options can have at that time of the month. Nevertheless, still working to increase out speed, my partner and I both agreed to take little extra time to pack the bags, and that if we were receiving them, we would have been appreciative of someone taking a little more time to put that much thought into it.