The students braved the night from 9 p.m. to 8 a.m for this year's Pit Sleep-In, despite below-freezing temperatures and early classes Monday morning.
"We tried to be a visible presence to get the word out," said participant Rebecca Denton, a senior psychology major. "By morning, it really hit home because it was freezing."
The sleep-in was just the beginning of the Campus Y's annual Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week, which includes dinner discussions, a movie night, a hunger banquet and a donation drive.
On Monday night, a dinner discussion co-sponsored by Criminal Justice Action and Awareness featured informative talks about homeless people using prison as an escape from homelessness, said Sarah Fashaw, co-chairwoman of Criminal Justice Action and Awareness.
The next event in the series will take place today, when the Campus Y shows the movie "With Honors" from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. in 209 Manning Hall.
Meredith Hatch, co-chairwoman of HOPE, a hunger and homelessness outreach committee in the Campus Y, said the movie will be followed by a discussion of the media's stereotypes of the homeless.
The banquet, which will be held in Carmichael Ballroom, assigns each participant a level of wealth and gives them food according to that assignment.
The week's discussions will return to the issue of homelessness Thursday evening with guest speaker Kriti Sharma. Sharma works with students and homeless people in Chapel Hill and Carrboro to produce a monthly newspaper called "Street Speak," which covers everything from political to human interest issues.
Sharma, a sophomore environmental studies major, will speak about students' perceptions of homeless people.
"The discussion will be centered on student interaction with homeless issues and the University's role in addressing poverty," she said.
Throughout the week, Advocates for the Empowerment of Women of Color and Suited for Success, two subcommittees of the Campus Y, also are collecting women's toiletries and baby products to donate to homeless women with children.
The drive is geared toward professors because they have easier access to grocery stores, but everyone is encouraged to drop items off in the box at the Campus Y, said Catherine Varner, AEWC co-chairwoman. She said the Inter-Faith Council will then distribute the items to the women.
Hatch said she hopes the discussions and the donation drive will open students' eyes to the issue of hunger and homelessness, which is otherwise foreign to many people.
She said, "The motto for the week is 'learn and act.'"
The University Editor can be reached at udesk@unc.edu.
