Sunday, September 13, 2009

STAND First Meeting of the Semester!

UC STAND Meeting Minutes. Sept 9, 2009

1. Brief Introduction on STAND: Chapter History, past advocacy and fundraising events.

2. UC STAND Keeps a blog at http://ucstand.blogspot.com , where we post meeting minutes, event information, links or any other new articles. Currently authored by Serena (semithbaokar@ursinus.edu) , Lindsay (lihogan@ursinus.edu) and Ryan (rycollins@ursinus.edu) . If you are interested in contributing as a writer or a photographer, please contact Serena so she can add you as a contributor.

3. Resources: Ursinus Community Service Office (UCARE). Please contact Ryan at rycollins@ursinus.edu , if you have any ideas or suggestions or need any help in participating in any community service activity. The Office is currently located in Students Activties Office in Wismer Lower. Also, UCARE is looking for interns next year, so in case you are interesting applying please talk to Ryan Collins.

4. POTENTIAL EVENTS (FALL 2009): (Some of the events could be during a “themed” week)

a. A possible letter writing event (Not decided which crises yet, Burma is a potential)

b. Work and/or support Burmese nuns from an Indian monastery. Many of these nuns have been involved in pro-democracy movements in Burma. As the military junta doesn’t mind having shamed itself, it might be more effective to support pro-democracy movements. It might be possible to wire money to a pro-democracy organization.

c. We are still looking for possible speaker. It would be ideal to have John Prendergast (more info here) and we are going to work on that. We might get more speakers from Dr. PatricK Hurley from the environment department, on mining and other conflict resources (like oil in Sudan, tin and tungsten in DRC, which have the sources of much of the conflict)

d. Attend STAND Protests/Retreats in Philadelphia, DC, or anywhere in the Mid-atlantic region!

e. Have a brown bag lunch, possibly next month.

f. Possible Advocacy campaign: Use drawings made by children who were exposed to prolonged violence in Darfur as a possible campaign. We could use Olin Plaza to have our campaign

g. We could also plan a die-in (a protest where protestors lie on the ground) to simulate dead bodies.

h. Work on a shared microfinance project with SIFE (students for free enterprise) on microfinance and have a workshop with the rest of the campus about it. Possible NGO: Digitaldivide.org which trains Cambodians affected by the genocide in data-entry

i. Instead of giving pictures of chilis at Chilli’s, give them pictures of something related to Darfur.

j. Possible Films: Invisible Children, BBC Panorama Documentary on Darfur, The Killing Fields

k. Have more informal dinners between members to brainstorm (Look for announcements)

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