International Civic Engagement

Park University's Model UN Team Wins Prestigious Award

By Toni Cardarella:

Park University's Model United Nations team was named the outstanding delegation in the Security Council, one of the most prestigious awards given at the annual American Model United Nations (AMUN) conference.

Student representatives Simona Cibotaru and Salam Lazkani won the outstanding delegation award at the Nov. 17-20 conference in Chicago for their representation of Indonesia in the Security Council.

"The Security Council award is especially prestigious since most universities send their most capable and experienced delegates to the Security Council," said Steven Youngblood, assistant professor of communication arts at Park and advisor to the university’s Model UN team.

Model United Nations is an authentic simulation of the UN General Assembly, Security Council and other UN committees, which catapults students into the world of diplomacy and negotiation. In Model UN, students step into the shoes of ambassadors of UN member states from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe to debate current issues on the organization's vast agenda. The student delegates prepare draft resolutions, plot strategy, negotiate with supporters and adversaries, resolve conflicts and navigate the UN's procedural rules. They do all this in the interest of mobilizing international cooperation to resolve major problems that affect every country.

In the competition earlier this month, Cibotaru and Laskani considered issues such as Iran, Darfur and the crisis in Pakistan.

"The level of preparation from the other Security Council delegates is very high, so you know that you have many competitors," Cibotaru said. "You have to be always knowledgeable about the facts and issues."

Cibotaru is a senior majoring in political science and international business. She is originally from Chisinau, Moldova. Lazkani is a graduate student working on his master's in business administration degree. Currently, he is finishing an eight-week internship at the United Nations in New York. Lazkani is originally from Syria.

The two were among 18 Park University Model UN participants at the American Model United Nations conference, which hosted 1,300 students from 115 universities. At the conference, the students represented 135 countries, and debated real issues facing the UN. For example, student delegates tackled topics such as providing housing for the poor, nuclear proliferation and the advisability of imposing economic sanctions.

"Our team was very well prepared," Cibotaru said. "Each team member put a lot of work into presenting (Indonesia) in the best light possible."

Youngblood added, "Our delegates were in the thick of things in each committee. They not only participated, they excelled."

The Park’s Model UN team will represent Peru at the National Model United Nations conference in April in New York City. The team, which is co-advised by George Belzer, is sponsored by the Office of International Education and Study Abroad. Belzer founded the MUN program at Park. Belzer is an adjunct professor of international relations at Webster University.

For more information about Park’s Model UN team, contact Youngblood at (816) 584-6321. or Steve.Youngblood@park.edu.

New UN Report Spotlights Critical Link between Hunger, Health and HIV/AIDS

[Courtesy of the UN News Centre]

In a major report released ahead of World AIDS Day, observed on December 1, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) has called for paying greater attention to the link between hunger and health, pointing out that food is often cited as the greatest need by people living with HIV/AIDS.

WFP’s World Hunger Series 2007 – Hunger and Health explores the relationships between hunger and poor health with particular reference to HIV/AIDS. It notes that while countries invest billions into anti-retroviral treatment (ART) and other medicines to address the pandemic, they overlook the fact that people receiving life-saving drugs often lack food and clean water.

The agency points out that as with any drug, anti-retrovirals are more effective when people are adequately nourished, and food support can help ensure that people who lack food benefit fully from their treatment.

“It is irresponsible to ignore the issue of hunger and malnutrition particularly in the battle against AIDS,” said WFP Deputy Executive Director Sheila Sisulu. “Why should we write off the benefits of medical interventions simply because people are too undernourished to absorb and benefit from the drugs they desperately need?”

Studies show that people with HIV have special nutritional needs, the agency says, noting that even when a person consumes enough food, if they lack certain vitamins and minerals, their immune system is compromised, making them vulnerable to infections.

“Food is often cited by people living with and affected by HIV/AIDS as their greatest and most important need,” said Elizabeth Mataka, the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for AIDS in Africa.

Speaking at a seminar in Rome, at which the report was presented, she added that “nutrition interventions for HIV programs are often overlooked in the international HIV policy debate and they remain critically under-funded.”

In a related study, the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) predicts that 900,000 people going onto ART in 2008 will require food assistance. It is estimated that the average cost of providing food support to a patient is $0.66 per day – less than 2 per cent of the current cost of drug programmes.

WFP, one of the first organizations to provide food assistance alongside ART in poor areas, now supports ART programs in 16 countries in Africa, benefiting over 182,000 people. With active HIV/AIDS interventions in 50 countries worldwide, the agency is providing food assistance in 21 of 25 nations with the highest HIV prevalence rates.

Fueling the New Creative Economy

Bob O'Neill, executive director of the International City/County Management Association (ICMA), recently wrote an interesting column for Governing and the Government Innovators Network in which he identified eight insights learned from communities that have, or hope to, build diversified, successful economies:

1. Recognize worldwide competition
2. Play to existing strengths
3. Partner with initiators and accelerators to develop creativity
4. Support institutions such as workforce training centers and community colleges
5. Leverage connections to other regions and networked approaches
6. Employ social networking and marketing
7. Use basic infrastructures and regulatory flexibility to support creativity
8. Create sustainable, eco-friendly communities that attract creative companies and people

O'Neill's interest in this subject matter is significant, because local governments will play a critical role in providing support and a framework for a thriving creative economy.

Southern Growth Seeks Student Applicants for Southern Research Fellows Program

Southern Growth Policies Board seeks student applicants for its Southern Research Fellows Program. The Southern Research Fellows Program promotes student research relating to economic development and quality of life in 13 Southern states: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.

Eligible applicants include current undergraduate and graduate students aged 18 - 25 at colleges and universities in the 13 Southern Growth member states. Suggested majors/fields of study include, but are not limited to: public policy, journalism, political science, education, sociology, business, city & regional planning, public administration and social work.

The focus of the 2008 Southern Research Fellows Program is the engagement, development and leadership of youth aged 14 to 24. Fellows will prepare an original report on an approved topic that will be incorporated into Southern Growth's 2008 Report on the Future of the South and distributed at Southern Growth's annual conference. Fellows will also receive a cash award of $1,000.

Relevant report topics for 2008 include youth development, civic engagement and strategies for building policies and partnerships that foster youth leadership skills, workforce preparedness, volunteerism, entrepreneurship and the traits to become active, responsible citizens. The application deadline is January 11, 2008, with selections announced by February 1, 2008. The fellows’ final report to Southern Growth Policies Board will be due March 31, 2008.

To learn more about the Southern Research Fellows Program, and to download application forms, please visit www.southern.org/research/fellowship.shtml. To learn more about Southern Growth, visit http://www.southern.org.

United Nations Human Development Report

[Courtesy of UN News Centre]

Without immediate action, climate change could have a disastrous impact for the world’s poorest people and reverse any gains made in poverty reduction, nutrition, health and education, according to the annual United Nations Human Development Report released yesterday.

The world’s 2.6 billion people living on less than $2 daily have contributed least to global emissions. But they are “paying a high price for the actions of others,” Claes Johansson of the UN Development Programme (UNDP), which prepared the report, told reporters in New York.

“Therefore, developed nations have a historic responsibility to cut emissions, to climate-proof their growth and to invest in efforts that can help prevent catastrophic reversals in human development,” he added.

Developing countries, in turn, must do their part to reduce their own emissions, but cannot do so without the help of wealthier nations, Mr. Johansson observed.

The report – entitled “Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world” – was released as governments prepare for next week’s UN Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia, where delegates are expected to negotiate a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol, a legally binding pact limiting greenhouse gas emissions that is due to expire in 2012.

The potential toll on humans of climate change has been understated, the report concluded, pointing out that meteorological shocks such as droughts, floods and storms, whose intensity and frequency are only increasing, contribute greatly to poverty and inequality.

“For millions of people, these are events that offer a one-way ticket to poverty and long-run cycles of disadvantage,” it said. A “twin track” approach merging mitigation efforts to limit global warming this century to under 2°C with bolstered global cooperation on adaptation measures was recommended.

On mitigation, the report urged developed countries to slash greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050, and promote carbon taxation, more stringent cap-and-trade programmes and energy regulation, among others.

If developed and developing nations are able to cut emissions overall by 50 per cent by 2050, “this gives us a 50-50 chance of avoiding dangerous climate change so this is an absolute minimum required reduction in emissions,” Mr. Johanssen noted.

For rich nations to help poor ones achieve this goal, the report proposed a Climate Change Mitigate Facility at a cost of $25-$50 billion per year to finance development of low-carbon energy systems in developing nations.

Regarding adaptation, the disparity in ability between rich and poor countries to respond to climate change are creating even larger inequalities both between and within countries, the report warned, calling on developed nations to make global warming a main priority in their international partnerships to reduce poverty.

Currently, only $26 million has been spent multilaterally for adaptation measures, which the report noted is the equivalent of one week’s worth of spending on flood defences in the United Kingdom.

Call for Proposals - 17th National Annual CCNCCE Conference

The Community College National Center for Community Engagement (CCNCCE) invites you to submit a proposal to present at its 17th national annual conference, Recipes for Student Retention through Service Learning and Civic Engagement, to be held on May 21-23, 2008. The deadline for submitting proposals is February 4th, 2008.

Conference presentations are 1-hour or 90-minute sessions, which should be designed to be highly interactive. Proposals to present at the conference must be submitted in electronic form. In keeping with the theme, some of the issues you may wish to address in your workshop are:

• The role of student leadership and service in student retention
• Strategies for retaining students through service learning and civic engagement
• How to market your service learning program for student retention
• The role of service learning partners in helping students stay in school
• Incorporating service learning and civic engagement into the curriculum
• Effective evaluation and assessment of service learning programs
• Research in service learning and civic engagement
• Showcase your innovative service learning program or project

To submit a proposal for the 17th Annual Conference, visit:
http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/other/engagement/2008Conf/CallForProposals.jsp

Deadline for Submission: February 4, 2008
Notification by: March 1, 2008

Younger Generation Redefines Public Service

From GovExec.com:

President Kennedy's call for young people to serve their country once energized an entire generation, and government institutions such as the Peace Corps and the Foreign Service were often the beneficiaries. If a president made a similar appeal today, young people might respond by asking not what they could do for their government but what they could do for a nonprofit organization.

The very meaning of public service has changed, and the transformation has had huge ramifications in Washington. Young professionals today often choose careers in the nonprofit world, as opposed to traditional jobs in government agencies. The rise of nonprofits, advocacy groups, think tanks, and lobby shops has made it much harder for federal agencies to attract young people to government service. Even when aspiring public servants enter government, they are often enticed to leave by job offers in the nonprofit or private sector.

Greg Berger, a 23-year-old administrative assistant with Public Citizen, a group founded by Ralph Nader, liked the idea of working for an independent organization. "I was very attracted by the fact that they don't take corporate or government money. The fact that they have a mandate to really do what their members think is the right thing to do. And they're not tied down by any other major political goals. And I think that gives them an incredible amount of freedom," he says.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=38641&dcn=e_gvet

Lectures on Social Capital and Economic Development

From Fabio Sabatini of Social Capital Gateway:

Dear All,

this is to let you know that a series of lectures on "Social Capital and Economic Development" will be held at the Faculty of Political Science of the University of Siena from November 28, 2007 to the end of January 2008. The Syllabus, downloadable suggested readings and other useful information are available at the address:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-sienalectures.html

Votehelp

I received the following message from Suzanne Soule from the Center for Civic Education:

I wanted to alert you to a new website we've developed, VoteHelp - a nonpartisan candidate calculator that helps you choose who to support based on the issues. VoteHelp informs you on the issue positions of leading Republican and Democratic presidential contenders, and also rate how important these issues are to you.

Key 2008 issues include: immigration policy, the Iraq war, national security, civil liberties, drilling for oil, global warming, corporate regulation, agricultural subsides, taxation, the minimum wage, free trade, social security, health care, education, the death penalty, decriminalization of marijuana, homosexual rights, abortion, stem cell research, and gun ownership. Hundreds of hours of research went into capturing the nuances of the 2008 Candidates' positions. Candidates' positions were determined by their speeches, debates, their own websites, interest group ratings, and voting records.

The purpose of the site is to provide Americans with objective information on how their own views compare to where the Presidential candidates stand on the issues. 

http://www.votehelp.org/ might prove a useful tool for civic educators and their students in the upcoming elections.

For more information, please see
http://www.prweb.com//releases/2007/11/prweb570916.htm

Engaging Citizens in Measuring and Reporting Government Performance and Community Conditions

My ASPA colleague, Alfred Ho, has written the following report:

Engaging Citizens in Measuring and Reporting Government Performance and Community Conditions: -- A Manager’s Guide 

Alfred T. Ho
Associate Professor
School of Public & Environmental Affairs
Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis

Report link:  http://www.businessofgovernment.org/main/publications/grant_reports/details/index.asp?gid=301

This report presents specific guidelines to local public managers as well as nonprofit leaders on how they can work with each other and with citizen representatives to use public input to guide government performance and community conditions reporting.   This report challenges the traditional notion of “performance management,” in which public managers dictate what indicators should be used and how data should be analyzed and presented and suggests that citizen engagement should play a larger role in the process.   

Two models of public engagement are recommended in this report.  The “partnership” model emphasizes equal sharing of power between citizen representatives and public officials in deciding what and how performance indicators should be used.  This model is illustrated through a case study of the Des Moines “Citizen-Initiated Performance Assessment” project in 2001-2004, which was a partnership between the city government of Des Moines, Des Moines Neighbors, and several universities in the region.  The second model, which is the “community indicators” model, gives even more power to the public by empowering and supporting nonprofit organizations in a community to measure the quality of life and policy outcomes through self-organized efforts and collaborative partnerships between government, nonprofit and business organizations.  This approach is illustrated in this report through a case study of the Boston Indicators Project, which just released its 2004-2006 report in June 2007.   

From the Des Moines and Boston experiences, the report provides specific recommendations on the following aspects:

• how to prepare government and community leadership to engage the public in performance measurement and community conditions reporting before the project launch;

• how to solicit public input and engage the general citizenry effectively in designing performance indicators;

• how to report community conditions and program results effectively to citizens so that the content of the report, whether in paper or in electronic media, is meaningful, understandable, accessible, and credible to citizens;

• how to engage the public in follow-up after the release of a performance report so that the analysis can be used to empower policymakers, community leaders and public managers to take responsive action.