Advocacy

When discussing advocacy with students, students have been able to understand the injustices in the world and form their opinions around those injustices based on conversations in class and through discussion-based activities. The Why America? Initiative, as well as classroom instruction, has provided students with information in ensuring that students are understanding of how past injustices have affected their communities, families, and themselves.

Students are learning to advocate for themselves through several different ways in the classroom. The most tangible of these ways includes advocating for themselves and their communities through writing letters to their elected officials and using a teacher-created program to advocate for themselves in their classroom and school.

One of the ways that students are learning to advocate for themselves is through writing to their elected officials, but in Washington, D.C., students were amazed to learn (during the Why America? Initiative experience) that they did not have elected officials that could represent their voice in Congress with a vote. Students began asking for more information about why D.C. does not have full representation in Congress and what they could do about it. Click here to find out more about how students wrote letters to advocate for themselves and their community.

Classrooms are democratic environments, and students at Bridges learn about democracies through interactions with their teachers, peers, and administrators. Classroom responsibility and class jobs are one way that students work together in the classroom, and two of the classroom positions offered are Student Advocacy Representatives. The representatives (one boy and one girl) work with the teachers and their peers to ensure that student voice is heard in the classroom. Click here to learn more about our Student Advocacy Representatives.

Students are continuously learning to advocate for themselves as well as learning how to advocate for others and the injustice that they see around them. Giving students the tools they need to create informed opinions and strategies for advocacy are a few of the ways that students are continuously learning about advocacy in my classroom. Teaching students to identify injustice and giving them strategies and the confidence to stand up for what is right is one of the ways that we can encourage students to use their voices and understand that their voices and actions are meaningful.

Forward to Advocacy: Student Advocacy Letters

Morgan Frye, M.Ed.

Master of Science in Education

Students have knowledge of injustice in the world, have informed opinions about it, and know that their voice and actions have value. They can advocate for themselves and others.

Introduction

Advocacy in Room 302 at Bridges Public Charter School

Click on the activity to learn more

Writing Letters to an Elected Official: D.C. Statehood

Student Advocacy Representatives

Conclusion