Ashley Nelson

Helped write letters for NWA gives!! And discussed the impact of the donations people gave!!

Gathered to discuss plans for the year and talked about changing the story of disabilities!!

This semester I've gotten to mentor Seth and Ben once a week every week since 2nd semester started. It has been a great way for me to be involved with some students on campus!! I have really enjoyed getting to know them and be apart of the EMPOWER program.

Took a survey about a variety of things on campus from mental health resources, parking, and satisfaction with buildings on campus.

During this meeting, we got to hear from our two guests that have siblings with disabilities that lived and still live in places other than their homes. It was fascinating to hear and also hard to hear. I learned a lot about disability and how it was seen years ago and just made me grateful for bEfriend even more than I already am.

During our 4th meeting, 4/5 members made it. Nathan, Mustafa, Eira, and I met up in the law building at a different time than normal and it was fun. During this meeting, we again talked about them being here because of contracts with their countries and they explained how school growing up went and how they came to Arkansas. After our meeting we all walked on campus together to get to our next locations.

During meeting #3 we had a new member from Panama join us. Nathan, Mustafa, and I welcomed eira and had a great discussion. This meeting consisted of how we greet people in our countries. The differences in how we respond to people saying what's up on campus and overall traditions and food from the countries we love. Since Eira was new, she and I discussed how she liked it here and it was just fun having another girl in the group to switch things up.

During meeting #2 I finally got to interact with a student here from Iraq named Mustafa. It was such a cool experience and I learned a lot from him. I wish to help him better his English because that is something he really wants to work on. I think he does a great job and talking louder is the only advice I would give.