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From: Cathy Dowd, LWVM Citizen Education Committee
Subject: New Youth Civic Advocacy Program to offer at your local high school
If you would like to deepen your League’s relationship with your local
schools and public officials and to build your visibility in the community
through civic education, you may be interested in the new Youth Civic Advocacy
Program being launched by LWVM.
The Youth Civic Advocacy Program is designed to get kids excited about political
participation by enabling them to engage on a real state or local issue and to
affect change. This is done via some lecture/discussion on how to be a political
advocate, followed by small group work on a real issue chosen by the students.
The students research their issue, plan their lobbying, PR, and grassroots
activities, and then get a chance to lobby a local or state official on their
chosen issue.
The program was piloted this spring at Needham High School, where it was a great
success and will be repeated this year. In Needham, I taught a four session unit
to three sections of senior AP Government classes in between their AP exams and
graduation. If appropriate for your school system, we can either offer something
very similar or we can adapt the curriculum to used in another setting, for
instance as a way to train after-school political clubs, or in other subjects or
younger grades. Your local needs would be the determinant.
I would be happy to teach the entire unit again myself, to work as a team with
someone from your League, or to train your League to offer the program on your
own. I hope to offer a training session at the upcoming Super Saturday training
day in January.
If you are interested in exploring the Youth Civic Advocacy Program further,
please contact League office.
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