Posted on June 26th, 2009 at 2:11 pm by Emily.Stivers
We’re thisclose to our goal of 100,000 signers on our Water for the World petition, but we need your help to get there before next week. If you haven’t already, please sign the petition, here. And if you’ve already signed, please share it with your friends through a friendly email or posting the link on Facebook, Twitter or another social networking website.
More than 90,000 ONE members from across the country have signed our petition calling on senators to cosponsor the Paul Simon Water for the World Act of 2009. This critical legislation will put American ingenuity and resources behind the global effort to bring clean water to the 884 million people who struggle to survive without access to this most basic resource.
But just as dirty water is a major obstacle to ending global poverty, a lack of Senate cosponsors is the biggest obstacle to passing the Water for the World Act. The bill is currently stuck in the Foreign Relations committee and needs more cosponsors to get the attention of senate leaders. Our campaign has already helped convince one senator to cosponsor the Water for the World Act — just imagine how many more will jump on board when we show up to deliver a call to action from thousands of their constituents.
Next week, ONE staff and volunteers are going to deliver this petition directly to Senate offices on Capitol Hill. That means we only have a few more days to spread the word about this important campaign. Please help by signing the petition if you haven’t already, and sharing it with your friends if you have.
It’s going to take at least 100 thousand of us to help bring first-time, sustainable access to clean water and sanitation to 100 million of the world’s poorest people in 2015. Together, I know we can do it.
Posted on June 10th, 2009 at 10:00 am by Chris.Scott
Pooja Gupta is interning with the ONE Global Policy Team this summer, and today writes about an exciting new tool to spur youth involvement in combating hunger.
The World Food Program (WFP) recently launched a web platform aimed to educate and inspire youth to get involved in the fight against global hunger which, according to WFP reports, has afflicted an additional 115 million people in the past two years alone. On their newly-updated website, WFP has created a section dedicated entirely to students and teachers that includes information and games for students, as well as ideas and activities for teachers. By designating a section entirely to education, WFP hopes to provide teachers with the tools necessary to fully integrate issues of global hunger into the everyday school curriculum, making it a staple in primary and secondary school education.
WFP notes that youth are deeply interested in the fight against global hunger. In their news release, WFP’s Director of Communications and Public Policy, Nancy Roman explained, “Today’s youth are hungry to know more about the problems which are causing food shortages across the globe — like conflict in Pakistan, high food prices, climate change and the global financial crisis.” To satisfy their curiosity, WFP offers a variety of web tools targeted at students and their teachers, hoping to engage both while inspiring them to take action on their own; the site even provides ideas for activities that students can host within their local communities. The hope is, with this education and awareness, participating youth will be poised to become future leaders in the fight against global hunger and poverty.
WFP hopes the site will be a “one-stop shop,” for students and their teachers. Notable educators around the world, including Cape Breton University, Auburn University, and 4-H Alabama, made contributions to the platform, which includes a blog, a list of resources and websites that educate about issues of hunger, classroom activities, and a section for interactive “fun and games.” The site also features WFP tools already popular, like numerous interactive games such as FreeRice.com and Food-Force.com. These games, in addition to entertaining, also educate students about the difficulties of providing hunger relief, as well as motivate them to take action themselves.
WFP’s “Students and Teachers,” platform hopes to enlist youth in the global campaign to end hunger by engaging them throughout their schooling. The “Students and Teachers,” site joins other successful, youth-oriented WFP initiatives such as the “Universities Fighting World Hunger,” and the “Really Good School Dinner” campaign, which promote youth engagement through awareness, education, and action. If you haven’t yet checked out the new site, you can do so here.
Posted on June 4th, 2009 at 1:43 pm by Emily.Stivers
Senators Durbin and Corker have introduced S. 624, The Senator Paul Simon Water for the World Act of 2009, a bipartisan bill to provide 100 million people with access to clean water. But with only five cosponsors, the bill isn’t getting the attention it needs for further action by Senate leaders. It must have at least 20 cosponsors to move forward.
By working together, ONE members everywhere have an opportunity to make a big difference for millions of people. This bill would also help establish the capacity and momentum we need to meet the Millennium Development Goal on increasing access to water and sanitation by 2015. Please encourage your family and friends to sign the petition here.
My passion for ending world hunger and poverty all started when I was in high school through a program called Empty Bowls. It was here, in high school, when I first heard of ONE and learned that it was a way for me to continue doing the amazing work in the fight against poverty, disease, and world hunger. It seems that so much of what I’m doing now, my major at Clark University, my dreams of one day working for a non-profit, and my overall world view, all stem back to high school. Because of this, I was honored when I was asked to go back to my high school and speak about ONE at Empty Bowls.
Empty Bowls is a program done in schools across the nation and is a way for students to raise awareness, education, and money to end world hunger. The students make bowls out of clay to sell to the community all while educating everyone on hunger both locally and globally. The program has been continually growing to the entire school district being involved along with many other members of the community. Hundreds of bowls were sold, local artists donated pieces that were sold through a silent auction, and many other efforts were put forth to raise money. After participants bought bowls and were given a meal of rice and bread, all came to the program where I had the chance to speak as the keynote speaker.
With over 700 people in the audience, I told how Empty Bowls was what ignited my passion to fight world hunger and how the ONE Campaign is a way to continually fuel that passion. I commended those in the audience for the efforts put forth that night. Together, the members of my hometown community in Osceola, Wisconsin raised over $18,000 to fight hunger. This money will make an amazing difference for the lives of so many, but what I also felt was that each person also had the opportunity to change their own lives by signing up for ONE.
It was so great to go back to my high school and have the chance to continue working for ONE beyond the school year. It seems everywhere I go I can find a chance to talk about ONE and try and spark the same passion I have for ONE’s goals. At the end of the program many people came up to me to ask more questions and I was more than happy to talk. Hopefully I can keep on finding more ways to reach out to my community back home and find some more ideas for OCC next year!
Posted on May 17th, 2009 at 1:04 pm by Emily.Stivers
You’ve honed your video-making skills over the last year through the OCC. Now how would you like to win an all-expenses-paid trip to Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival this June?
ONE partner Oxfam has teamed up with YouTube and Cannes Young Lions for an exciting competition. They’re looking for young YouTube filmmakers to create a video explaining why December’s United Nations climate change summit in Copenhagen is one of the most important meetings in human history.
This is a vital time in the fight against climate change. With December’s climate talks fast approaching, this competition is a great way to spread the message that climate change costs lives. All films must urge international decision makers to do a deal that slashes carbon emissions and helps developing nations to adapt to the effects of climate change.
You must be aged between 18-28 to enter the competition, but if you’re not you can still take part by watching the entries, leaving comments, or forwarding your favorite videos to your friends.
Video entries have to be between 30-60 seconds long, and you can read the competition rules and instructions on how to get involved on YouTube’s website.
Posted on May 15th, 2009 at 1:32 pm by Emily.Stivers
Michigan and Wisconsin Campus Outreach Ambassador (COA) Stephanie Parrish is a rising junior at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, where she has led the Wolverines to be the only 3-peat challenge winner and a close runner-up for our grand prize. Her consistently above-and-beyond leadership along with her strong application have earned her a spot on OCC’s first-ever Africa trip, this July.
At U-M, Stephanie studies Public Policy and African Studies, and plans to study abroad in 2010 in South Africa while simultaneously volunteering with the Treatment Action Campaign on HIV/AIDS issues. After college, Steph wants to pursue either a master of Public Health, Public Administration, or Public Policy degree through a program called Master’s International, which would allow her to complete coursework at a school in the US and be placed with the Peace Corps upon graduation. Eventually, she sees herself doing nonprofit field work in advocacy or research.
Stephanie has been a member of ONE since 2007, when she researched the organization for a class project. As the COA for Michigan and Wisconsin, she now recruits potential campus leaders on all college campuses in these states in an effort to grow the OCC in her region.
Under Stephanie’s strong leadership, the University of Michigan started the season off right by winning the very first challenge of the year: Campus Launches. They went on to repeat their success with our “ONE in Your Face” challenge, creating an impressive set of visual displays in Ann Arbor. Then U-M became the first school ever to win THREE challenges in one year when they took top honors for our Video Super Challenge in the post-season.
U-M went on to submit an amazing final project and ultimately rank within the top 3 OCC schools in the nation. You can check out Stephanie and her team’s final project here.
And as if that wasn’t amazing enough for one student in one year, Stephanie’s thoughtful and thorough design for an outreach program to maximize the impact of her trip to Africa really knocked it out of the ballpark. Check it out, here.
Congrats to Stephanie, and the other four Africa trip winners!
Posted on May 14th, 2009 at 12:10 pm by Emily.Stivers
Tomas Moreno, a rising junior at Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, is a Campus Challenge superstar. Besides serving as Campus Outreach Ambassador (COA) for the Carolinas, Tomas successfully led his team to the Power 100, the Top 10, and finally to become the 2008-9 OCC champions.
At Wofford, Tomas is studying Sociology and Economics with a concentration in African and African American Affairs, and an additional minor in Government. He has traveled to Mexico with Rotary International several times, and worked with an orphanage in Romania in 2008. He’s active with ONE partner organization OXFAM, as well as a bunch of other campus organizations. Tomas has plans to join the Peace Corps upon his graduation, but more immediately, he will be an organizer for Bread for the World in San Francisco this summer.
Tomas joined ONE in 2006 when a friend, who had first heard about ONE in her house of faith, “banded” him with a white ONE wristband. As COA for the Carolinas, he has recruited new campus leaders in those states and successfully mentored them to become as engaged as he is.
This past school year, his tireless work mobilizing his campus was rewarded when Wofford finished in first place in OCC, becoming the 2008-9 Campus Challenge champs despite being a campus of less than 2,000 undergraduates.
Posted on May 14th, 2009 at 11:20 am by Aaron.Banks
Congressman Howard Berman (D-CA) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) have introduced a bill that will begin the long process of updating America’s anti-global poverty efforts. The bill is called the Initiating Foreign Aid Reform Act, and it’s the first step of many in reforming how we do development work. By directing the president to write a new strategy, successful passage of the Berman-Kirk bill will move us closer to our goal of bringing development into the 21st century.
American anti-poverty efforts save lives in the developing world every day, funding AIDS drugs and anti-malarial bed nets. Our commitment to development makes it possible for farmers to improve their yields, and for more children to go to school, breaking cycles of hunger and poverty.
Please call your representative, using the House switchboard at (202) 224-3121, and ask him or her to co-sponsor HR. 2139: the Initiating Foreign Aid Reform Act.
Posted on May 13th, 2009 at 10:41 am by Emily.Stivers
Melissa Boles, a rising junior at Washington State University in Vancouver, has faced more than her share of obstacles in advocating for ONE and Campus Challenge. Yet her determination and spirit have shined through, and helped earn her place on the first-ever OCC trip to Africa this summer.
Melissa is pursuing a degree in Social Science with an emphasis on Political Science and Anthropology at WSU-Vancouver. She has spent some time in Mexico with her church, and is considering joining the Peace Corps after she graduates. Eventually, she seeks a career in nonprofit work.
A member since hearing about ONE at a Coldplay concert in 2005, Melissa took the initiative to learn about and sign up for Campus Challenge through the OCC website right when the program launched in 2007. Since then, she has worked diligently to mobilize her campus around ONE’s issues, and does so without much support from a spread-out and often politically-disengaged campus.
But throughout the discouragements she has endured, Melissa’s campus still placed in the Top 100 schools in the country (out of about 2,400) by the end of the regular OCC season.
“I’m passionate enough about ONE to take on all that comes with running a club on campus by yourself,” Melissa wrote in her trip application. “Emails, scheduling meetings, tabling, and the frustrating outcome of others not really being interested…First-hand experiences and stories are what touch the hearts of others. I feel this trip would help me to really be able to do that; to touch the hearts of others.”
Melissa worked tirelessly in our individual actions competition in order to be considered for a spot on the Africa trip, accumulating tens of thousands of “individual action” points just in the two short weeks open for individual point submissions. Her subsequent application for the trip was both thorough and outstanding.
Posted on May 12th, 2009 at 3:33 pm by Chris.Scott
We’re inviting you to lift up your voice and inspire others to join and act with ONE in the fight against extreme poverty.
The ONE Sermon Challenge, part of ONE Sabbath, invites leaders and members of congregations across the country to create and submit sermons connecting their own faith to these vital issues and lift up the important role of advocacy as an act of faith.
Today we are faced with a global financial crisis in which the world’s poor are the first and most adversely affected. Yet we have proven solutions: Two million people living with HIV/AIDS in Africa receiving lifesaving medicines. Millions of families protected from malaria thanks to simple bed nets. Tens of millions of African children going to school for the first time. and YOU.
Continuing through May, the ONE Sermon Challenge will accept original and inspirational sermons, d’ivrei torah, and khutbas related to global poverty and collect them online at ONE.org. Through the ONE Sermon Challenge, pastors, rabbis, imams and other faith leaders have the chance to share their message to ONE’s millions of members and congregations nationwide, inspiring advocacy and action. At the ONE Sermon Challenge you’ll find inspirational preaching from many traditions, including original Christian, Jewish, and Muslim messages all lifting up a call for action against extreme poverty and treatable, preventable disease.
At the ONE Sermon Challenge you can read Rev. Abby King Kaiser’s inspiring word on the “Work to Do,” download and listen to Rabbi Eric Solomon’s reflections on the role of prophetic leaders like Martin Luther King and Abraham Joshua Heschel, or watch Imam Johari Abdul-Malik’s inspiring Friday khutba on the vital role advocacy plays in fighting global poverty and treatable, preventable disease.
Participants that send us their inspired message will receive a ONE Sabbath Action Pack, resourcing them and their local congregations with next steps to act with ONE.
Last week I caught up with Pastor Eugene Cho, of Quest Church in Seattle, at the Sojourners Mobilization to End Poverty here in Washington DC – he shares his challenge to you to do your part and join the ONE Sermon Challenge:
The OCC Blog is a daily log of the ONE Campus Challenge, a competition among American college students
to prove that their campus has the most creative and effective extreme poverty fighters in the country.
The site is operated by ONE volunteers and campus leaders.
The content of each post represents the views of that post's author and does not necessarily reflect the
views of the ONE Campaign. ONE does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office, and any posts
expressing support or opposition for a candidate is not endorsed by ONE.
Understand how the ONE Campus Challenge works by reviewing the rules. All participation in the challenge is subject to the terms and conditions in the rules.
We’re thisclose to our goal of 100,000 signers on our Water for the World petition, but we need your help to get there before next week. If you haven’t already, please sign the petition, here. And if you’ve already signed, please share it with your friends through a friendly email or posting the link on Facebook, Twitter or another social networking website.
