Lauren Simpson led 15 barefoot students and residents across the National Mall this evening as part of a global TOMS Shoes campaign to raise awareness for shoeless children.
“It makes you really think about what they have to go through,” said Simpson, founder of American University’s TOMS club.
Simpson organized the awareness walk with Catholic University of America and George Washington University. However, no GWU students participated. The students walked in the grass from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial while Simpson carried a TOMS flag.
Over 1,600 global events were planned for the “One Day without Shoes” campaign and 88,000 people registered to participate, said Blake Mycoskie, TOMS Shoes founder, in an e-mail. The campaign began three years ago as a way for people to understand how much a pair of shoes can impact a life.
The campaign was created to encourage people to walk barefoot for one day. TOMS is a business that gives one pair of shoes to a child in a developing nation for every pair a customer buys.
Simpson, as well as most of the other participants, had gone barefoot since waking up in the morning. Their silent statement worked, as some of the students were asked why they were not wearing shoes.
“I feel like people need to be aware that there’s things in the world other than what they’re used to,” said Brittany Rock, an AU junior. “They think of Third World countries, but they don’t think of kids without shoes.”
While some of the students said they were given odd looks by residents, they kept their shoes off. Walking barefoot as they went about their regular activities was an opportunity to share the cause.
None of them complained about the condition of their feet, but they did mention that they noticed which walkway textures felt better to walk on. The hot pavement in the afternoon was another issue but did not stop them from supporting their cause.
