This Is Long Overdue

It's been a while since my last post, forgive me. A lot has happened, and all the while, a lot has not happened.

Last Wednesday marked the Global Day of Action Against Poverty. It also marked what was going to be our very first event. Obviously it was not going to be anything huge for we weren't recognized at the time and didn't have funding, but we had some things up our sleeves.

The plan was to have a table set up near our infamous Speaker's Circle with flyers, letters to Congressmen, sign-ups, and general info. We were also going to advertise for our event that night. The plan that night was to invite different groups from campus, students, and members of both the faculty and the community to come and openly discuss the issues of extreme poverty. Everything was ready. I had confirmation from FOUR different groups on campus and enthusiasum from different people I had talked to. I even made a banner and different posters and flyers for the event.

Wednesday roles up and it is raining. Pouring. This means we cannot table. Alright, that's not the end of the world, right? Right. Because the end of the world came later that night. Not a single one of the groups that had commited to helping us out was there. You know who was there? Me, five of my sorority sisters, and a bunch of empty desks. Cool.

On a different note...

WE GOT RECOGNIZED AS AN OFFICIAL GROUP YESTERDAY!
...and we have a budget due this Friday.

So hopefully with this recognition and funding we will be able to have the means to get our word out in the biggest way possible. I am going after class today to get a design made for a banner - a real banner, not one I paint in my basement. That's exciting. AND we're getting t-shirts made. People LOVE t-shirts.

After all that has happened last week, all the hurdles and disappointments, things once again begin to look up. So for all of you reading this, you better feel sorry for me and come to our next event. Right now, we're looking into speakers to bring to campus, so let me know your thoughts.

ONE Vandalization

Sorry to the three people that read this. It's midterm week and I've been slacking. On the blog that is.

Anyway, I had this great idea to chalk around campus the night before our next meeting to advertise it. Sounds good right? Wrong. I get this email during the day from ORG. Apparently chalking is illegal. Who knew? I didn't, and if you've ever walked around MU's campus, neither do the Ron Paul supporters. So I had to go around campus with a bucket and a broom and clean up my vandalizing. Thank god Ashely Reed helped me with that. My arms are still sore.

So this whole Campus Challenge thing is getting more and more difficult. Not because I'm having trouble coming up with events or ideas or anything. I have event ideas coming out of my toes. It's the money. Even when our group becomes officially recognized on campus, we aren't eligible for funding until next semester. That's a big blow when you want to make tshirts and order wrist bands and get bands to come perform. But I guess we'll just have to do what we can and if we can do as well as we're doing already without any money, then we'll just blow up once we get funding.

I think that's all for now. We're putting the final touches on our Oct 17th Global Day for Action Against Poverty event so look out for that.

She's a Maneater

The media always finds its way into everything that is going on. However, in this case, it's a good thing. A very good thing. I received an email early this week from a staff writer of The Maneater, MU's student-run newspaper. He says he is writing a story on the ONE Campus Challenge and wants to know how our ONE Chapter is doing - he found our facebook group and I guess that's how he got my name and email. What did we do before facebook?

Anyway, the article is great. Real informative and more importantly, it lets people know what we're all about and that if this Campaign is going to work, we need people power.

Read the article.
http://www.themaneater.com/article.php?id=27646

Sign-up
http://www.one.org/campus/mycampus.html?id=-3312080-tX.Lju&school_id=2160

Make a difference.

ps, shout out to Mr. Cone's classes! You guys are awesome!

An Early Epiphany

I had an epiphany today. All day yesterday I got on my friends to sign up because we needed the points. We were tied with Villanova for majority of the day, and I wanted to pull ahead. We did, and we stayed ahead of them until today, when we dropped from 11th to 16th. Ouch.

So naturally I got out the point sheet to see how I could rack up as many points as possible. Then it hit me - the epiphany. When I wanted to bring ONE to Mizzou I didn't do it because I wanted to outshine everyone. I wanted to do it because we have the right environment to make the Campaign huge and make a difference. Then the College Campus Challenge was launched and my competitive side was unleashed. It suddenly became about the points - how to win.

It wasn't until today, when we dropped five places, that I realize this. I had everything ONE related covering the floor of my room and I decided to stop making this about the points, but to make it about what it is supposed to be about - change. After all, that's why the Challenge was launched, to give chapters motivation and make it fun and rewarding, while giving us ideas along the way.

Maybe that's just what people who aren't in first say to make them feel better about themselves. But here is my motto from now on out, stretch this chapter beyond it's potential and the points will fall as they may.

Don't get me wrong, I'm still all for the Challenge. I love it, it's just that now motivation for winning has moved from a battle for points back to a desire to get the word out. It's a new kind of challenge now, a replenished motivation, and if my inclination is correct, we are not going to be a force to be reckoned with.

Congratulations Villanova, you pulled ahead.

For now.

The Beginning

Here's the thing, I've never blogged before, so this is kind of awkward for me. This is my advanced appology if it should read that way.

Here's the story in a nutshell: I replied to an email sent by the ONE student outreach coordinator about bringing the ONE Campaign to the University of Missouri's campus. She then gave me the email address of another girl from Mizzou who also replied to that email. Her name is Jane Silcock. Jane and I exchanged emails, and then met to talk about business. Once we figured everything out we set up a meeting with the ORG VP of Administrations.

After meeting with her, we had to sit down and write a Constitution. We had requirements that needed to be met by both the University and ONE. After combining the two, a Constitution was born. The next step was to have a meeting. I had already created a facebook group, and there were over 100 members, so I thought this would be easy. Just send a message to everyone, and they'll come running. Wrong. There were a total of eight people at our meeting. All of them were my friends. Talk about disappointment. We needed to elect a board within the month and eight people show up, mostly because I ragged on them to. Granted, we weren't allowed to hang up signs and posters around campus yet because we were not reckognized by the University yet. But nonetheless, I was disappointed. (ps, thanks for showing up guys!)

Anyway, the next day I get this facebook message from a guy at Webster. He tells me he founded the ONE Campaign up there and asks me if I've been in touch with a teacher who has been on the ONE Blog and works in Columbia. I look up the teacher. Matt Cone is his name, and this guy is incredible. His students spoke so highly of him in these articles, I had to meet him. I wanted him involved in our Campaign. So I got his email, shot him a line, and hoped for the best. And oh yeah, did I mention this guy from Webster's best friend goes to Mizzou and wants to get involved with our Campaign? Things were looking up.

I get an email back from Cone the next day. He is real busy and wants me to call him. Awkward. But I did. I told him what was going on with our Campaign so far and he is real excited. He tells me his students are doing a big project on AIDS in Africa and he is inviting people from the community to come and hear what they have to say and engage in a discussion afterwards, and he wants me to go. I did. It was amazing. Those kids know so much about the problems and why they happen and what it is going to take to stop it. People need to listen to our youth more often.

So that happened and then ONE launched the Campus Challenge. Talk about motivation. The first day we were top 20, then we dropped to 78. Then I got my ass on facebook, wrote down all of my friend's email addresses that went to Mizzou. Sent them all invites to sign-up. Now we are #12. And we are still pending to become official on campus. Things are looking up. ONE is going to be huge at Mizzou. In Columbia.

I dedicated this past weekend to ONE Mizzou. I am completely obsessed because I know if this gets big enough, we can change things. We will change things. We have the resources, and we're not going to let them go to waste. I won't let them. There is too much at stake.

If you're reading this and you haven't signed on to the ONE Campus Challenge, you should. You better after reading this. Here is the site.
http://www.one.org/campus/mycampus.html?id=-3312080-tX.Lju&school_id=2160

Follow our story. It's going to be a good one.