Help with content & word limit: eg of how the pandemic has changed your involvement in the community

Hello, I am applying to UBC as a transfer and I needed help with a prompt. I am currently not sure about content and the word limit is exceeding by 80-ish words. Help would really be appreciated. Thank you.

Give us an example of how the pandemic has changed your involvement in the community or group most important to you?

What have you learned from this experience?

(maximum 200 words)

The pandemic struck suddenly. In mere days, my city entered a stage-4 lockdown, my school and dance classes closed, but when my family business shut down, I realized the gravity of the situation, especially how badly it'll affect people who live hand-to-mouth. I had recently started exploring sustainable fashion and I decided to sell my clothes online and donate all of the amount I earned. There wasn't much to lose. However, in India, there's a lot of stigma against second-hand clothing and additionally with covid, there were a lot of obstacles. People were reluctant to buy worn clothes and scared of being scammed. On the small amounts of orders that I got, either the shipping rates were really high or the post offices were shut. Moreover, I hadn't considered the costs of sanitizing the clothes and packages. However, I was stubborn and kept my page up; consistently posting the recent trends, promoting my page and utilizing instagram's tools. In a month, my followers grew from 156 to 3400 and I currently have 10,056 followers. We've managed to raise more than $1950 profit for people who have been affected by covid by providing them with food and basic necessities. This experience taught me how to be selfless, giving me a reality check on the privilege that I have and that I can use it to help others. I had thought that in order to raise any amount or bring a change in such difficult times, I'm going to have to invest a lot or do something on a grand scale however this experience taught me that regardless of whatever war we are fighting, perseverance is extremely important.

The essay does not involve itself with a community or group that you belong to. The charitable act that you undertook was in relation to your business ventures, which means it does not follow the classification of "community or group". So one can say that the response is not reflective of the prompt requirements. You have to speak of this in a manner that is less about you and your business and more about the community. So the reference point, that could still involve your business is to portray an enlightenment regarding those who had less in life than you in the community. These could be neighbors who lost their jobs or people coming to you asking for financial help or simply, food to eat. Then you can explain how you used your business to help them. Using such a presentation will show your involvement in the community instead of discussing it as an accomplishment of your business. Just make sure to explain that you were not involved with the community feeding program at first, explaining why you did not think to support the feeding program before the pandemic. Then reflect on how the pandemic changed your mindset about helping feed the poor in your community. The focused discussion should bring your word count down to the 200 word mark.