To the Northwestern Community:

On January 12, 2010, the world watched as a massive earthquake struck the island nation of Haiti, resulting in unimaginable destruction. As a community of Northwestern students, we felt an urgent duty to respond.

Drawn together by this sense of responsibility, representatives from over forty student groups met and organized a school-wide campaign to support the relief efforts. NU STANDS WITH HAITI was formed, with a modest goal of $8,000 — $1 for each undergraduate student.

Performing arts groups and professors, students and social action groups, religious groups and residence halls united, planning fundraisers overnight and dedicating their annual events to the cause. The result was staggering: over $18,500 were raised, more than twice our initial goal.

Our efforts were greatly strengthened together by the Evanston community. With the Evanston-based Haitian Congress, students arranged to send more than twenty boxes of supplies; our partnership with them continues. In recognition of this partnership, the Lewis-Sebring Family Foundation generously pledged their support for NU STANDS WITH HAITI by providing a matching grant of $10,000 toward our fundraising efforts, bringing the present total to $28,500.

We are pleased to direct these funds to Partners In Health and the American Red Cross — two reputable organizations who were among the first to respond in Port-au-Prince and have continued to provide vital services. This campaign could not have been successful without the students, faculty, and staff who organized and participated in the many events, and we thank them greatly.

While Northwestern’s contribution is remarkable, we hope that this is the beginning of an ongoing conversation about the conditions that preceded this catastrophe and on the long, arduous rebuilding ahead. It is up to us as a community to sustain our energy and passion to ensure that we continue to stand with Haiti.

In solidarity,

NU STANDS WITH HAITI

A few months ago, we told you about the Unreasonable Institute, which will bring 25 social entrepreneurs from around the world for a 10-week summer institute where they’ll receive the training, mentorship, and seed capital they need to get their ventures off the ground.

Now, our friends are one step closer to choosing their first crop of social entrepreneurs. 34 finalists are in a race to raise $6,500. The first 25 to cross the finish line will attend the Unreasonable Institute. And the outcome of this race is up to you.

Head to Unreasonable’s online Finalist Marketplace and vote with your dollars for an entrepreneur you believe will change the course of history. The fate of our finalists, and of the lives they will affect, rests in your hands.

The RGK Center for Philanthropy and Community Service in the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin and Dell are seeking undergraduate and graduate students from universities and colleges around the world to share their ideas for making the world a better place.

Students winning the grand prize in the 2010 Dell Social Innovation Competition will receive $50,000 to turn their ideas into a new business or nonprofit with a mission to change lives for the better.

To participate in the competition students brainstorm and submit a creative, innovative idea to tackle a pressing social issue and enter it no later than March 1, 2010 to the Dell Social Innovation Web site. Along with students, citizens worldwide are invited to comment on, vote for and discuss the ideas in the online community forum. The community’s preferences help select the grand prize winner.

Teams selected as semifinalists by judges and the community will be asked to write a business plan and submit a three-minute video for consideration. Of the semifinalists, three teams will be invited to Austin, where they’ll present to a panel of judges for the chance to win the grand prize.

Submissions will be judged on overall concept, demonstration of the opportunity, assessed social impact, financial viability and sustainability, demonstrated leadership ability, management team, performance benchmarks, assessed risk and contingency plans.

Although we are only months away from GES 2010, we felt that it was extremely important to talk about the crisis occurring in Haiti right now and tell you what we’ve been doing to respond.

• Thursday afternoon, a number of students contacted Northwestern’s President Schapiro to encourage him to “articulate a university response in reaction to the earthquake.” President Schapiro responded by posting a link on the university’s homepage with information on organizations assisting with relief efforts.
• On Wednesday night, a bill was passed in Associated Student Government (ASG) Senate stating that “ASG’s Public Relations committee or a committee of dedicated ASG senators/students will help…to coordinate a school-wide fundraiser to collect anything that might be of help to those struggling in Haiti.” We’ve reached out to the Senator leading the committee and will be a part of the organizing efforts. In particular, the committee will be planning a week of events intended to raise funds and awareness of the crisis in Haiti. GES will be spearheading a panel discussion intended to provide students with the historical and social context they need to fully understand why Haiti has been so devastated by last week’s earthquake.

The bottom line is that this is an important moment for GES as an organization and, more importantly, a community, to demonstrate its ability to respond thoughtfully to an international crisis that is unprecedented in GES’s short history. This is an opportunity for us to demonstrate what being “globally engaged” really means.

To be honest, we are both struggling to find an appropriate way to respond as a community that prides itself on engaging with global problems beyond writing a check or watching the news. Does fundraising for Haiti fit GES’s values? Should we work with other groups on campus, such as ASG or GlobeMed? How should GES mobilize its remarkable passion and commitment to respond to the catastrophe in a way that sets an example for the rest of the Northwestern community?

CommDev facilitated an activity addressing some of these questions on Tuesday with our staff, but we invite all of you, as our extended GES community, to contribute to the discussion. We encourage all of you to get informed and think critically about what’s happening right now in Haiti. There is no doubt that GES will take tangible action, and we want your help in figuring out what this will be. As always, feel free to email us or post below.

Thanks for reading, M & A

But just because we’ve gained greater visibility in the field doesn’t mean that GES is only for the most advanced delegates.  GES values diversity – and we don’t mean just ensuring cultural diversity (although we have that, too).  We’re talking about diversity of perspectives.  We want people from big schools, and people from small schools; people with a lot of experience, and people with none; people with well-developed projects, and people with only the spark of a good idea.  We construct everything from our curriculum to our outcomes opportunities with this diversity of perspectives in mind.  Last year, we offered workshops on fundraising and webtools at the beginner and advanced level.  Our outcomes opportunities were similarly multi-tiered, targeting projects at the idea, planning, or implementation stage.

We believe that everyone who’s passionate about and committed to global change should have a seat at the table. And that everyone, from the delegate who started her own NGO, to the delegate who took a class on refugees and decided to do something about it, has something to contribute and learn from each other.

So the bottom line is this: don’t be intimidated!  There are sure to be some pretty notable delegates at GES 2010.  But there will also be delegates who you haven’t heard of.  Yet.

There’s still time to apply!

International Delegates Application Deadline: DECEMBER 15, 2009

American Delegates Application Deadline: DECEMBER 30, 2009

GES staffers attempt to complete some school work while managing the summit headquarters for GES 2009.

GES has 12 teams, with 26 co-chairs, 66 staff members, and two directors.  That’s 94 people.

And they all have midterms.

It takes three days to respond to an email.  People are cranky from late nights in the library.  Starbucks cups are ubiquituous at our Tuesday night meetings.  Planning for a conference more than five months away is a low priority when a paper is due in less than five hours.

GES’s greatest strength is its greatest challenge.  Sometimes it feels like GES has all of the same problems of other relatively young nonprofits combined with those of any university student group.  We cultivate new donors, build partnerships, and engage supporters and alumni while dealing with university bureaucracy, navigating administration, and, yes, maintaining student commitment despite academic commitments.  Being student-run is the very thing that makes GES so special, yet the most challenging part of it.

How do you legitimize your organization in the social change space while embracing the fact that your staffed by a group of passionate, committed, smart people who just happen to be below the age of 23?

Throughout its five years, GES has realized that it takes a lot of professionalism and critical thinking to make the conference work.  But our dynamic community, tireless passion, and willingness to take risks are just as pivotal to our success.

And so is Starbucks.

GES is at a unique place as an organization and an event.  As we embark upon our fifth year, we have established a dynamic network, spanning over 40 countries, 80 colleges and universities, and 50 nonprofits.  As anyone who has attended the Summit will tell you, though, these numbers aren’t what makes us special.  GES provides unique opportunities to continue learning long after the Summit.  This blog is just one aspect of that mission.

Liz and Molly, our Alumni Co-Chairs, will be posting more information on the blog’s features and contributors.  You’ll be hearing from us periodically with updates as GES 2010 gears up.  We hope you’ll join us for the ride.

We are continually impressed and inspired by the tireless commitment, passion, and creativity we see every day in the GES community – from our workshop facilitators, to our delegates, to our staffers here at Northwestern…and we can’t wait to read all about it.

Megha Agrawal and Allie Bream
Co-Directors, GES 2010