Community Education

While is may be daunting to think of educating a community of your peers and elders, this step is easier than you might think. There are many creative and fun ways to educate people about the important global issue your New Global Citizens project addresses.

It is important, of course, to first learn the basic facts about the issue you take on and become familiar with some of the global statistics. But remember, you don’t have to know everything to educate others! You can use flyers with basic information, and if someone has questions that you can’t answer, this is the perfect excuse to plan for a follow-up conversation after you have done some more research. It also teaches you one of the most effective phrases for someone trying to create change: “I don’t know, but I will find out and get back to you.”

Getting Started

First, you need to decide on the goal of your outreach activity. If, for example, your project raises money to send girls to school in Afghanistan, you could focus on a few different issues:

Do you want to communicate the basic facts about the number of girls that do not go to school around the world?

Do you want to highlight the ways in which all of society benefits when women are educated?

Do you want to educate your peers about gender inequality in Afghanistan?

Of course you can do all of these, but remember that you don’t have to accomplish everything in one activity. Often, activities with a very specific goal are the most powerful.

The following are some ideas for ways that you can start to educate people:

• Set up a table at school during a break-time and hand out informational flyers.
  
• Ask a teacher if you can give a presentation during class.
  
• Put posters up around school or your neighborhood with information or statistics relating to your project.
  
• Walk through your neighborhood as a group distributing information about your project.
  
• Submit announcements to your school bulletin and newsletter with information about your project.
  
• If your school has a live assembly or morning announcements in classrooms, ask if you can include your project or a startling/interesting fact about your issue in either one of these.
  
• Create a “Super Quiz” with 5 questions and answers about your project and ask teachers at your school to try them with their classes.