Kyle Evers' Tuesday started like many other people in Gainesville. He woke up at about 7 a.m. next to his wife with his dog at the foot of the bed.
He then got up, ate breakfast and took a shower. But the difference between Evers and most other Gainesville residents is that he woke up in a tent, where he has lived for the past three months, and his shower and breakfast came from St. Francis House, a local homeless shelter.
Evers, 21, spoke at UF Tuesday night along with three other homeless or previously homeless people as part the Society of Professional Journalists' "Faces of Homelessness" Speakers Bureau program. Eighteen students attended.
Evers and his wife have been homeless for the last several years. They came to Gainesville's Tent City three months ago from Palatka.
Tent City is a wooded area off of Depot Road in southeast Gainesville where many of Alachua County's 1,600 homeless people live.
The bureau regularly brings homeless people to UF to speak to students and dispel stereotypes, said Amanda Gunn, coordinator of the bureau.
"It's a learning event, we're trying to break the myths about homeless people," Gunn said.
When Gunn asked the audience what they thought when they heard the word "homeless," responses included "dirty," "mentally disturbed" and "bearded."
Yet the homeless people in the room met none of the descriptions.
Three of the four said they had been raised in middle-class families and never expected to be homeless.
Gunn said that many don't realize why some people end up on the streets.
Reasons range from natural disasters, losing jobs, domestic violence, lack of affordable housing or substance abuse, she said.
Colin Simmons, a 20-year-old journalism major, went to the event to learn more about the what the homeless go through.
"Seeing the dichotomy between young college students and young homeless people was amazing," he said.
