2003 National COOL Conference

Posted by on February 28, 2003

Don?t miss STUDENTS LEADING CHANGE – The 2003 National COOL Conference
March 13-15, 2003 – Cleveland State University

Register before March 1 for discounted rates.

In 2003, COOL is entering its 20th year as a national non-profit organization dedicated to student voice and power in making change and building communities through service, activism, and civic engagement. We?re approaching a time of change and redefinition ? including the launch of a National Student Advisory Board and a broader national forum for student voice, which will begin to take form at the 2003 National Conference. Please join us to ring in the 20th year with a bang!

As a past conference participant, we?re reaching out to you to encourage you not to miss this year?s conference, featuring:

Keynote speakers Adam Taylor and Paul Loeb:
Taylor is the founder and director of Global Justice, a non-profit organization that focuses on social justice throughout the world, engaging young people as leaders of change. In two years, Global Justice (GJ) has launched the successful Student Global AIDS Campaign on more than 200 campuses, engaging students in leadership development, service, and informed advocacy on fighting the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Now, GJ is launching the Campaign for Child Survival. Taylor is a young leader that brings refreshing insight and moral clarity to the ways in which young people can fully use the avenues for making change in our democratic society, including on the policy level.

Paul Loeb is the noted author of Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in a Cynical Time and other works on citizen responsibility and empowerment. As a writer for more than thirty years, he offers insight to the issues of apathy on college campuses, as well as the development of the service and service-learning movements. Loeb is currently a scholar at Seattle?s Center for Ethical Leadership.

Lifetime of Service Award Winners Wayne Meisel and Greg Ricks:
We want to celebrate the work and contributions of two gentlemen who?ve made outstanding lifetime commitments to service and social justice, including at COOL:
Wayne Meisel helped put student service and activism on the national map when he founded COOL in 1984, not only building the organization but also fostering recognition for service and student voice in the national landscape. As a young college graduate, he travelled to hundreds of campuses, helping to unite and highlight the work of students in communities. Wayne spent several years as COOL?s director as it helped build the student service movement. In 1993, Wayne became the founding President of the Corella and Bertram Bonner Foundation, developing a model campus- and service-based scholarship program that now works with more than 70 campuses and 2,500 students annually.

Greg Ricks has championed student voice and power throughout his professional career, which started when, at 23, he became Dean for the African-American Institute at Northeastern University. Subsequently, he has served for more than twenty years as a Dean at institutions including Dartmouth College, Sarah Lawrence College, and Stanford University. While at Dartmouth, he supported students? efforts to divest the university from apartheid South Africa. He has also served as a champion for the growing youth service field, working and serving on the boards for organizations like COOL, Youth Build USA, Public Allies, and City Year. Now, he leads City Year?s Clinton Democracy Fellowship program in South Africa, where he is helping the country?s young people to build a new infrastructure for social service and youth service.

At the conference, you can also participate in:

-An Opportunities Fair featuring more than fifty outstanding non-profit organizations offering programs, jobs, internships, and more.

-The Oxfam Hunger Banquet and workshops on globalization.

-As always, more than 150 participant-led workshops like “Conveying Your Passion to Congress: Introduction to Legislative Advocacy,” “Argh, It?s Raining Service Events and Fundraisers,” and “Student Perspectives on Community Based Research,”

-An array of larger panels on topics including diversity, anti-war coalition building (Not in Our Name), homelessness (Faces of the Homeless), careers in the common good, and more.

Day-long Forums including:
Institute for Community Service Directors, sponsored by CWRU, COOL, and Ohio Campus Compact
Building a National Platform for Student Voice, sponsored by COOL
Building It Up: Strengthening Campus Programs, sponsored by COOL
Putting Idealism to Work, sponsored by Idealist.org
The Deciding Factor: What?s Up with the Youth Voice Movement, sponsored by Youth Service America
Doing Justice, Building Community, sponsored by the United Church of Christ
Gandhi, MLK and us? Living a Life of Spiritual Activism, sponsored by Stone Circles
Global AIDS: The Crisis of our Generation, sponsored by Global Justice (SGAC)
Global Justice Forum, sponsored by Oxfam America
Hunger and Homelessness Forum, sponsored by National Student Campaign Against Hunger & Homelessness
Incarceration Nation: The US Criminal Justice System, sponsored by ACLU, the Moratorium Campaign, and the American Friends Service Committee
Organizing for Social Change: A Hands on Introduction to the Principles and Tactics of Community Organizing, sponsored by COOL
Your COOL City: Forging a Real, Local Student Service Movement, sponsored by COOL
Youth Service and Civil Society from a Cross-Cultural Perspective, sponsored by Youth Service International and Demokratikus Ifjusagi Alapitvany

If you’ve already registered, THANKS (and sorry but I can?t cross out new emails from old). If not, we hope you can join us.