Gopendra Bhattrai While working as a member of the COVID-19 Student Response Team, I met many students and community members in the country affected by COVID-19 pandemic. I would like to present you all with some of the efforts of the student response team in helping students, especially in the Midwest region. At the same time, I will propose some guidelines that haveevolved while working with the students, chapters, community organizations and individuals in the region. The effort and the proposed guidelines are relevant at the national level as well. Since its inception on March 20^th, 2020, the COVID-19 Student Response Team, NRNA NCC of USA has come a long way in its effort to help students affected by COVID-19 pandemic.This team has helped or in the process of helping students in Maryland, Virginia, Colorado, Kansas, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, California, Texas, Alabama, Minnesota, and other parts of the country. The response team has organized webinars, online discussion forums on different topics including but not limited to immigration, student visas, work authorizations, therapy, virtual yoga for stress relief and others. The spread of COVID-19 pandemic in the country has forced many colleges and universities to close their dormitories and other services in the campuses. Some students have returned to their homeland and others have moved to their relatives in the country. Many students have moved out to apartments. Since the services in the campuses have been cancelled many students have lost their on-campus employment and so are struggling to pay for apartment and buy food materials.

The purpose of the NRNA NCC of USA COVID-19 Student Response Team is to provide immediate help to these students. Taking into consideration the amount of funds available, NRNA NCC of USA has decided to help students in need and provide with food materials worth up to $100 per person.

Based on the experience with helping students in different part of the county, general working guidelines have evolvedwhich provide hope that this effort can be sustained in the future. This model emphasizes on the involvement of the NRNA NCC Chapters, local organizations, civic groups, and individuals right from the beginning as soon asthe needs for the students are identified. Although this model has beenused in the past, now it has become the core principal of the working guidelines.   Based on the experience of working with the students, other community members, organizations and chapters, the following are the proposed guidelinesfor the response team:

• Let students know that help is available for purchasing food materials.
• Encourage students to submit request for help.
• Contact students and find out in detail, what kind of help is needed?
• Encourage students to contact counselors, academic advisors, legal advisors,international office and explore other venues for help. The school may already have started some programs to help the students.
• Estimate and identify resources needed to fulfill the needs.
• Contact and share the information, both needs and the required resources, with the NRNA NCC Chapter, local organizations, community members and encourage them to be part of the solution.
• Once the needs and resources are organized, start planning on logistics to deliver the service to the students.
• Encourage and mobilize local community members/organizations to deliver the service.
• During this process, it should be emphasized repeatedly that we need to follow all the guidelines of the government (Federal, State, County, and others) on how to behave during the lockdown period? We will strictly maintain social distance between and among individuals asmandated by government at different levels.

Recently while organizing help for the students in the state of Kansas, Missouri and Minnesota, the student response team followed the guidelines closely which resulted in increased participation of the organizations, chapters and individuals in the state and outside of the state. Help was provided to more than 50 students in terms food materials. A sizable contribution was received from chapters, community organizations and other generous individuals in the state and outside. Logistic for delivery was planned together and food materials were delivered to the students by the members of community. The enthusiastic participation of the community members, organizations and chapters has given us hope that our effort to help the students who are facing difficulties due to CCVID-19 can be sustained in the future. In my opinion, following theworking guidelines benefited all involved, students arenow connected to thecommunity membersmore closely and the community members are aware of the difficult situation that students are facing. For NRNA NCC of USA and the organizations at the ground level, working together has enhanced the possibility of cooperation in the future.I think that this model, which emphasizes close cooperation with the community members, organizations and chapters, holds great potential for providing services in long run and so would like to suggest NRNA NCC of USA to follow in allof its future endeavors. [Coordinator, COVID-19 Student Response Team, Midwest ,NRNA NCC of USA]