Free The Children appeals to students

WHITBY -- Students at Sinclair Secondary School got a lesson in global citizenship when representatives of Free The Children stopped by recently.

"We want to try to give students a broader picture of what's going on in the world," said Free The Children representative Matthew Cimone of the speaking tour, which is sponsored by National Bank Financial. "We want to connect their abilities and their strengths to what's going on in the world, to show them they can make a difference."

Over the last year Mr. Cimone and his co-speaker, Shelby Pearce, have given their presentation to more than 30,000 students across Ontario. While student reaction varies, Mr. Cimone says he has seen an increase in youth exposure to global issues over the past decade as well as a rise in the amount of youth engagement overall.

"It's a true statistic that 50 per cent of our world is people under the age of 15," he said. "Youth are always connected, they're sitting at the forefront of networks all the time. They are ideal for fostering change and they're the strongest advocates we could have."

Ms. Pearce moved students with the story of how she became involved with Free The Children. After a diagnosis of Premature Ovarian Failure at the age of 17 dashed her dreams of raising a large family, she was despondent. When Free The Children representatives came and spoke to her own high school she felt inspired again and began thinking about adoption. The more she learned about Free The Children the more she realized that adopting would help only one child, she said, but by becoming more involved she could help countless children and maybe even change the world.

Barely 18 herself, Ms. Pearce shares a special connection with the students she speaks to and believes that youth can make big differences in the world.

"They have the most power," she says of the students she's spoken to across the province. "But often they're the most apathetic. We want to spread the message of social change."

Mr. Cimone and Ms. Pearce got students attention early with some eye-opening statistics. They said every child in the world could be educated for $10 billion a year, which sounds like a lot until you hear that $20 billion is spent worldwide every year on ice cream alone.

Students also learned that more than 20 million children have been orphaned as a result of the AIDs crisis and that one child dies every five seconds from preventable causes such as hunger, poverty and lack of access to medical care.

"These things, they happen even when we're not thinking about them," Ms. Pearce told the audience, as well as the rest of the students who were watching the presentation on Sinclair's television system. "The challenge is to think about it," Mr. Cimone said.

Free the children was started in 1995 by child rights activist Craig Kielburger. Since then it has grown into the world's largest network of children helping children through education. So far the organization has built more than 500 primary schools, allowing 50,000 students to attend school each day. For more information or to make a donation visit www.freethechildren.com.