Arise in the pandemic
This year has been very difficult for many reasons, as it has been for many others as well. I feel like it is important to state that all Arise participants and staff have been safe throughout Covid and we are very thankful for that. We are thankful for the many prayers and all of the support we have received during this time and thank you for being here reading about it now. We know that many have been wondering how Arise has been doing throughout the pandemic and we wanted to update you and share our perspectives.
Arise director update from Richelle:
During March when Chicago began shutting down, Arise had just come off a season filled with many events and successful sales. Arise was in a great season as a business and it was exciting. We were shocked and very disappointed that we had to be away from one another indefinitely and I wasn’t sure what that was going to mean moving forward. We shifted gears and focused our energy on encouraging the girls and maintained contact regularly. Our sales completely stopped for a few months and we were challenged to come up with creative ways to sell our jewelry in the midst of the pandemic. Since we are not able to meet in person as much, we began focusing on our online presence and with the hopes to increase sales online.
Thankfully Chicago’s stay at home order was lifted and we were able to have in-person classes for the summer from July through mid-August. It was a big adjustment for us, but we were so excited to hire on 4 HS interns to work part-time for the program and help manage some of the new requirements to maintain safety during Covid. It was a great chance for each of them to gain more professional skills as well as offer their skills and talents with creative aspects of the program. Some of the girls created online content, planned events and 2 of our girls have shared below how they managed throughout the summer.
Youth stories:
Hi, I’m Jayla and I’m a summer intern at Arise Creations. This summer marked my first year working with Arise and honestly I can say I love it. A few weeks ago, I started work again since the COVID-19 outbreak. I was really excited to get back to work, knowing that this time I wouldn’t only be in the high school class but that I would also be working with middle school girls. Though I was a little skeptical about travelling and going to work during the pandemic, staff ensured that there was nothing to worry about. As soon as I stepped into the building I could tell that they took everyone’s health seriously. Everyone was helping around the building to clean and disinfect while others kindly squirted hand sanitizer in your hand as you walked through the door. The outbreak has changed the way Arise operates. We now have procedures to make sure we’re six feet apart and sanitized, but this doesn’t affect us from laughing and still talking with one another. I love passing out snacks to the girls and taking time out the day to share how our day is going. My favorite part of the day is prepping the girls jewelry kits for them so that the girls don’t have to share anything and they have their own personal tools in their kits. My first two days I only created 3 urban hope necklaces, but on the third day I learned how to make them faster and it made me feel really accomplished and proud of myself. It’s our third week now and time has flown by so fast because I have so much fun working with Arise Creations. I love my job and I know in the long run it’ll help me build the skills I need to achieve my dream career.
As Jayla said, that’s how a day in Arise creations is. This is Gisselle and I am also an Arise summer intern. Some days one of us comes up with a lesson, whether we do a presentation or we sit down and study the bible and go into deeper meaning about it. Arise is a safe place where we come together not only to make jewelry but to talk with each other and help each other out. Before COVID-19 we had events where we had our own booth and actually had the chance to put Arise Creations out there so that our little business gets big someday. We look forward to having more opportunities to share our jewelry with you in person.
We love our supporters and those who reach out to us! If you want more information on a regular basis, you can follow us on our Instagram where we do giveaways and share more of what is happening in our class. All of our pieces have meanings behind them, if you guys have any questions about them, you can contact us and we can share more about the meanings with no problem!
