We Day!

The students of Room 18 spent part of the morning today watching We Day Winnipeg, via an internet live stream. We Day is an educational event and the movement of our time (put on by Free The Children, an international charity to help children around the world, started by Canadians Craig and Marc Kielburger) - a movement of young people leading local and global change. At numerous We Day events across Canada, well-known musicians, actors, and public figures, along with local activists, inspire children to ‘be the change’ that can truly end the worst forms of poverty, embrace we thinking and we acting and remove the barriers to youth being agents of social change. Children and youth are beginning to realize that every single day we all have the opportunity to make this world a better place. And everyone has a role to play. It’s a worldwide movement that proves anyone can change the world—and revolutionizes how we make that change.

As a result, the students have embraced the idea of participating in the 'We Scare Hunger' campaign. We Scare Hunger is Free The Children’s annual campaign to mobilize youth around local hunger issues. Every October 31st, thousands of young people take action to scare local hunger and poverty. By trick-or-treating for non-perishable food items instead of just candy, or collecting canned goods at school and in their community, they help support their local food bank and raise awareness about this very important issue. They not only make a tangible contribution to their communities, but also become knowledgeable advocates for change. In 2011 alone, over 290,000 people participated in the We Scare Hunger campaign. They donated a total of 833,648 pounds of food— enough to feed 164 families of four for a whole year!

So, tomorrow night, when the students of Room 18 go trick-or-treating, not only are they going to be looking to collect candy for themselves (yum!), they'll be asking for donations of non-perishable food items to help others. We're really excited to see how much we can collect!