Join the Center for Service and Civic Engagement Film Series: Focusing on families facing homelessness & hunger

COTS Champlain College September Screenings

documentary image from COTS

Please join us at Champlain College Auditorium for our September Screening Series. We’re partnering with Champlain College to bring the community three documentary films discussing poverty, hunger, and homelessness in the community.

Each film will be followed by a community discussion about the issues each film explores. We hope you’ll join us in thinking about how we can address these kinds of issues in our own community!
Admission and concession by donation.

INOCENTE, 2013 Academy Award Winner for Best Documentary Short Subject

Inocente FilmSeptember 10th, 6:30pm Champlain College Auditorium

Film Synopsis: A personal and vibrant coming of age   story about a young artist’s determination never to surrender to the   bleakness of her surroundings. At 15, Inocente refuses to let her dream of   becoming an artist be caged by being an undocumented immigrant forced to live   homeless for the last nine years.

Color is her personal   revolution and its sweep on her canvases creates a world that looks nothing   like her own dark past. “Inocente” is a timeless story about the   transformative power of art and a timely snapshot of the new face of   homelessness in America: children.

POOR KIDS, FRONTLINE

Poor Kids Frontline FilmSeptember 17th, 6:30pm Champlain College Auditorium

Film Synopsis: For   “Poor Kids,” FRONTLINE spent months following six children who are   growing up against the backdrop of their families’ struggles against   financial ruin. Filmmaker Jezza Neuman explored the lives of children living   in the suburbs of the nation’s heartland. They asked the children what being   poor in America really looks like through their eyes.

The result is an intimate   portrait of the economic crisis as it’s rarely seen, through the eyes of   children. At a time when one in five American kids lives below the poverty   line, “Poor Kids” is an unflinching and revealing exploration of   what poverty means to children, and to the country’s future.

A PLACE AT THE TABLE

A Place at the Table FilmSeptember 24th, 6pm Champlain College Auditorium

Film Synopsis: 50 million people in the United States — one   in four children — don’t know where their next meal is coming from, despite   our having the means to provide nutritious, affordable food for all   Americans.

Directors Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush examine this issue through the lens of three   people who are struggling with food insecurity: Barbie, a single Philadelphia   mother who grew up in poverty and is trying to provide a better life for her   two kids; Rosie, a Colorado fifth-grader who often has to depend on friends   and neighbors to feed her and has trouble concentrating in school; and   Tremonica, a Mississippi second-grader whose asthma and health issues are   exacerbated by the largely empty calories her hardworking mother can afford.   Their stories are interwoven with insights from experts.