Youth Leaders From Across the World Come to Minneapolis
St. Paul, Minn. — Our World, Our Future, The National Service-Learning Conference® and youthrive PeaceJam Leadership Conference, comes to the Minneapolis Convention Center April 11-14.
The three-day event will attract approximately 2,000 attendees from across the United States and many other countries, and will feature internationally recognized keynote speakers Geoffrey Canada, President and CEO of Harlem Children’s Zone, Inc. and Shirin Ebadi, Nobel Laureate. Nationally recognized for his pioneering work helping children and families in Harlem, Canada is a passionate advocate for education reform. He can be seen prominently featured in the Davis Guggenheim documentary, Waiting for Superman. Ebadi is the first female in the history of Iran to serve as a judge. In 2003 Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts for peace and women’s rights in Iran and across the Middle East. Ebadi is one of twelve Nobel Laureates who support the PeaceJam Global Call to Actions.
Conference participants, roughly one-third of whom are young people, will participate in dozens of workshops focused on service-learning, an educational strategy that gets young people addressing community needs, and their adult advisors using this innovative approach. “It’s a powerful educational strategy that is transforming schools and communities,” says NYLC CEO Kelita Bak. “Students are addressing real needs, teachers are excited about their curriculum, and communities are being strengthened.”
Minneapolis and Saint Paul will become a service-learning laboratory of sorts during the conference, hosting service-learning projects in numerous sites and offering tours of involved schools and community-based organizations. “The conference is a great opportunity to showcase all that is underway in Minnesota and to get involved locally,” said Donna Cook, Executive Director of youthrive. “Our youth leaders are ready to inspire the world with their plans to take action on serious community issues.”
For more information, visit www.nylc.org/conference.
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About NYLC
NYLC has been at the center of community service and service-leaning programs and policy development since 1983. It convenes The National Service-Learning Conference, offers adult and youth trainings, runs model programs, directs service-learning research, and develops service-learning resources.
About youthrive
The youthrive mission is to engage young people with adults to strengthen leadership and peace-building skills. To fulfill its mission, youthrive provides unique, standards-based curriculums and program models for youth in four age groups: elementary school, middle school, high school, and college. In all youthrive programs, young people become agents of positive community improvement through service-learning projects they design and lead in partnership with adults to address local needs they have identified.
About Service-Learning
Service-learning is a teaching method that enriches learning by engaging students in meaningful service to their schools and communities by integrating the process with established learning objectives. It emphasizes critical thinking and problem-solving, and tackles real issues such as hunger, the environment, and the educational achievement gap.
