Gateways for collaborative advocacy

The Gateways for Collaborative Advocacy program will utilize live digital videoconferencing and other e-technologies to provide comprehensive, professional training for youths in the fields of human rights and social justice advocacy. Training sessions will feature online, facilitated collaboration between students in the United States, Canada, Israel and the oPt, empowering participants to develop innovative tools to cooperatively formulate agendas of change concerning the Middle East conflict.

Through in-depth, personalized instruction and multi-point networking, students will learn to identify pressing issues, engage their international counterparts in meaningful cross-cultural dialogue, articulate the change they wish to create in the world, forge meaningful connections with civil, political and economic decision-makers, communicate their visions of change and evaluate the impact of their work. In practical applications of the training phases, students will work together to engage in real-world advocacy in a wide range of local and international decision-making forums, including meetings of corporate shareholders, university student unions, trade unions, elected members of government at the municipal, state and federal levels, and national faith-based initiatives. Students will not only learn the skills of advocacy, but through strategic partnerships and targeted action, they will pass through key gateways to the public sphere and leverage their contributions to the global policy discourse.

This program is tentatively scheduled to launch in May 2011.