This past June we were contacted by the Community Engagement Manager at Salvation Army Greater Philadelphia to create a series of videos for their upcoming Celebrate Hope Award Ceremony. The team at Salvation Army was looking to create videos to highlight three of their centers in North Philadelphia that are “doing the most good”. One of the centers, The New Day Drop-In Center serves as a meeting hub, and safe space in the Kensington section of Philadelphia that provides basic necessities, victim advocacy, crisis intervention, and safety planning as well as employment and legal assistance to any female-identifying individuals who are or have been exploited by the commercial sex industry. Another featured center,The Kroc Center, is a state-of-the-art 24-acre community center that hosts a variety of different services from aquatics to athletics whose mission is to enrich the lives of every member of the community it serves. The final center they chose to highlight, The Tabernacle Corps, is a pantry, community center and place of worship that offers various bilingual social services to those in North Philadelphia.
The goal of the three videos was to highlight one individual or “client” that had benefited from their services and combine those with staff interviews from each location. Since we’d be documenting vulnerable populations, we made it our mission from the start to tell each individual’s story with care and respect. As a team, we feel that all too often work that highlights social services ends up being told to the detriment of those receiving it. The title of the event “celebrate hope” needed to be felt throughout each piece. Among the obvious challenges of the sensitive nature of the topics discussed there were additional hurdles we needed to clear. For instance, Tabernacle Community Corps serves a predominantly Spanish-speaking community, and their selected client, who is originally from the Dominican Republic, did not speak English. Luckily, we were able to call upon hersocial worker and Salvation Army staff member, Wilda, conduct the interview and translate for us. Since Yahaira knows and trusts Wilda, it allowed her to be more comfortable in front of the camera and respond from a more genuine place.
The combined videos helped the Salvation Army exceed its fundraising goal of two hundred thousand dollars to raise a combined $214,400.00 which will go towards making a difference across the Greater Philadelphia Area through strengthening various social services The Salvation Army provides. We couldn’t be happier to help amplify the great work they are doing in our hometown of Philadelphia. For more information on The Salvation Army and their work in Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware visit Philadelphia visit: https://easternusa.salvationarmy.org/eastern-pennsylvania/
