Never Lonely in the Lone Star State: The Beauty of Community in San Antonio
Lauren Kouassi
1st Year MPH Epidemiology Student
I had the incredible opportunity of visiting San Antonio and conducting a Community Health Needs Assessment, specifically for the West side of Bexar County. I can easily say that this was one of the most informative experiences in my academic career. As someone who entered this field due to my passion for working with Black and Brown communities, I was already thrilled to get started. This excitement was coupled with some anxiety, however, within less than an hour of visiting the Neighborhood Place, those nerves were gone. The feeling of genuinely being accepted by the community brought me a deep sense of calm for the remainder of the trip. Shortly after our arrival, we started with introductions and a tour. During this tour, we learned about all of the incredible programs and initiatives that the Neighborhood Place offers. From support groups for grandparents raising children to free tax services to programs for teens to learn technical skills, there was so much meaningful work being done. I found myself getting emotional, seeing so many people passionate about helping their community. This was just the first of many powerful moments during the trip.
Throughout the week, we conducted surveys, focus groups, a neighborhood scan, a nutrition activity, and helped during a food donation drive. On the first day, we administered surveys to community members, giving us the opportunity to interact with people seeking various services. We also had a chance to meet several staff members. One interaction, in particular, was deeply meaningful and set the tone for the rest of our work. A staff member expressed his appreciation for us engaging directly with the community members and valuing their input. He spoke about the common dynamic in which people from large organizations and universities enter the community, take what they need, and leave. His words served as a much-needed reset and reaffirmed my purpose in this project. I was less concerned with gaining experience and more interested in learning from the community and contributing to the great work they were already doing.
The second meaningful moment was my experience with the focus group. The conversation was extremely informative, but again, what stood out the most were the one-on-one interactions with participants. I had similar discussions with some focus group members about how researchers engage with communities. These conversations reminded me that we were not just working in a community but with a community, collaborating toward a shared goal. The focus group members were also remarkably welcoming, making us feel like we truly belonged. We laughed, hugged, and shared stories and bonds that could not be captured in our data. Instead, these moments marked the beginning of genuine relationships between the community members and our team. It felt beautiful to then see those same familiar faces come back over the next few days for our nutrition activity and presentations. By the end of the week, I felt like I had really formed a connection with them, and as I expected, I already miss speaking with them.
All of this is to say that community was a huge theme for me during this trip. From the familiar faces to the amazing work that so many members of the community are doing both in collaboration with our community partners and not, there is so much beauty in the San Antonio community. Seeing a community like this in action was so important for me. It reinvigorated the part of myself that chose public health because I love people and communities. During this trip, I was able to step away from the purely "epidemiological" aspects—the data and analysis—and instead immerse myself in the lived experiences of the people around me. I hope to take back some of these values with me to Ann Arbor and eventually with me wherever my public health journey takes me (which honestly may be San Antonio again!).
I want to end this entry and my reflection on this trip by paraphrasing an important point brought up by one of the community members during the food donation. After reading the “Our Father”, he told us about why he has been called to do this work for so many years, and in much simpler terms than how he eloquently communicated it, he said to do this type of work, you have to truly love people and that his contributions to his community is an expression of that. I hope to embody that in my future of community-based public health.