Hello again, friends,

Over the next month, I’m going to be contacting various schools to see how their Spring planning is going. I’ll basically just be asking you what you’ve done so far, and what you plan on doing in the spring. Also, where can you go as an organization? How much more institutionalized can the Pledge get at your school? Perhaps more importantly, though, I’ll be asking you to give me one person who is basically “in charge” of the Pledge campaign. While it’s not a good idea for only one person to do the work, it is important to have one person at every school who coordinates the effort, and who is responsible for the campaign as a whole. So, be thinking about that as November rolls around. I hope to make contact with the majority of the schools by early December, as after that people will be getting busy with finals and so forth.

We’re trying to keep the web-page more updated and interesting. For instance, there’s a brand new list of schools that are participating in the Pledge. The list that had been up there previously was a little out of date. You can check out the new list here: http://www.graduationpledge.org/schools.html .

We here at the GPA headquarters would like to highlight the Bentley Civic Leadership Program, which sponsors the Pledge. This is a student partnership in the Bentley Alliance for Ethics and Social Responsibility at Bentley College. For those of you who may not be aware of Bentley, it is in Waltham, Massachusetts-just outside of Boston. Their Civic Leadership Program, under the guidance of Professor Tony Buono, could serve as an excellent model for all schools involved in the Pledge: http://www.bentley.edu/alliance/ . Also, check this out: http://www.bentley.edu/news-events/pr_view.cfm?id=2204 .

We here at the office are compiling a list of organizations that we have either already spoken to, or would like to get in touch with. If you know of any organizations (educational, research, philanthropic, activist, etc…) that you think we should get a hold of, let us know. Also, be sure to tell us why we should get in touch with them (e.g., can they sponsor events, give us money, advertise, etc…).

Recently, two students here at Manchester expressed an interest in working on the Pledge at a national level. If some of you are also wanting to help out in some way, here is a list of twelve possible things you can do to make the Pledge stronger: http://www.graduationpledge.org/helpopportunities.html.

Planning for the 2007 Leadership Conference at Humboldt State University (where the GPA will be prominently featured) is still under way. If you would like to help out in some way, or if you would simply like more information, contact Chris DeHart: cpd7001@humboldt.edu .

How do you feel about “stuff”? We were considering creating GPA merchandise in order to publicize, fund-raise, or simply to just be bought by people who want it. Would anyone be interested in purchasing some GPA hats/t-shirts/hoodies/etc… Let us know what you think.

Finally, in the previous update I had mentioned the group Focus the Nation. While the group has some good organizational attributes that the GPA could possibly use as models, I was in no way implying that our organizations should merge into a formal partnership. I apologize for any confusion this may have caused, but would still encourage people to check out Focus the Nation.

On behalf of Neil,
 
Zachary Paul Burton
Co-coordinator
The Graduation Pledge Alliance
Manchester College
zpburton@gmail.com
(317) 412-3006