Engaging the Youth

The featured story for today highlights the many actions Sarah McCune has taken to increase her involvement in travel and issues pertaining to the international community. From her college in Birmingham, Alabama to Rio de Janeiro, Sarah has been actively involved in engaging and connecting the youth from across cultures. She is now working on creating a North American Youth Network to connect organizations from around North America that utilize their youth constiuency to achieve cross-cultural success.

The U.S. Center for Citizen Diplomacy applauds Sarah's efforts to connect youth from around the world. At the US Summit for Global Citizen Diplomacy in November, we will be discussing the role of youth in citizen diplomacy. Sarah exemplifies the role of youth citizen diplomat.

Do you have ideas of ways youth can be actively involved in diplomacy? Share your story with us. We'd like to hear from you!

Read Sarah's story below.

I would like to tell you a little about myself, how I found the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations and along the way hopefully provide you with more understanding about what we are trying to do here at the Alliance.

I am a rising junior at Birmingham-Southern College in Birmingham, Alabama. I moved to Montana my sophomore year of high school after being raised on St. Simons Island, Georgia. I did not know about Interfaith until I started questioning my faith near the end of my high school education. I wondered how anyone in my faith could justify Buddhists going to hell or anyone who did not believe the same way as myself.

I started studying Buddhism more in depth and when I arrived to my first week at college I was taken to the local Dharma Center for Tibetan Buddhism, how appropriate I thought to myself. I was then able to attend the Interfaith Youth Core conference in Illinois last year and met Dr. Eboo Patel, along with many other individuals who all shared the same belief I did--religion is a complex web that must be critically analyzed and used a catalyst for reform. While at this conference I attended a private session on the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations. I had no idea who this group was or what they were attempting to accomplish at this Interfaith conference. This is the mission statement I was presented with:

The United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) is an initiative of the UN Secretary-General which aims to improve understanding and cooperative relations among nations and peoples across cultures and religions, and to help counter the forces that fuel polarization and extremism.

The Alliance was established in 2005, at the initiative of the Governments of Spain and Turkey, under the auspices of the United Nations. In April 2007, the United Nations Secretary-General appointed Jorge Sampaio, former President of Portugal, as High Representative for the Alliance. The AoC is supported by a Group of Friends; a community of over 85 member countries and international organizations and bodies.

Working in partnership with governments, international and regional organizations, civil society groups, foundations, and the private sector, the Alliance is supporting a range of projects and initiatives aimed at building bridges among a diversity of cultures and communities.

The Alliance functions, both globally and within the UN system, in the following capacities:

*A bridge builder and convener, connecting people and organizations devoted to promoting trust and understanding between diverse communities, particularly; but not exclusively; between Muslim and Western societies;(this is now extending to beyond the restricting definitions of Muslim and Western)
* A catalyst and facilitator helping to give impetus to innovative projects aimed at reducing polarization between nations and cultures through joint pursuits and mutually beneficial partnerships;
* An advocate for building respect and understanding among cultures and amplifying voices of moderation and reconciliation which help calm cultural and religious tensions between nations and peoples;
*A platform to increase visibility, enhance the work and highlight the profile of initiatives devoted to building bridges between cultures; and
* A resource providing access to information and materials drawn from successful cooperative initiatives which could, in turn, be used by member states, institutions, organizations, or individuals seeking to initiate similar processes or projects.

The Alliance works in four program areas to support such projects. These areas are: youth, media, education, and migration.

The Alliance does not intend to duplicate or replicate the work others are already doing. Rather, our goal is to help expand efforts that are already underway.

At a political level, mainly through role of our High Representative President Sampaio, former President of Portugal, the Alliance works to establish platforms for dialogue among political, religious, media and civil society personalities who are prepared to use their influence in advancing the Alliance of Civilizations' objectives.

After reading this mission statement I was slightly overwhelmed, I thought that this was for professional diplomats or those well equipped with UN knowledge. Previous knowledge I had of the UN was a bureaucratic system that took forever to achieve resolution on world issues.

Fortunately, I met Isabelle LeGare, the Youth Program Manager! She is the most humble and hardest worker I have ever met. She genuinely cares about the Youth! There is no rhetoric with her and her honesty is a testament to how successful the youth program is here at the Alliance.

I found out that Youth is one of the United Nation's Alliance of Civilizations priority areas and for me that provided a way for me to experience this work firsthand. This organization is different from other UN initiatives because it encourages youth participation and active participation.

I went back to my college and inquired about contracting an internship in conjunction with our Hess Fellow program, which pairs students in the Leadership Studies department with advocacy based organizations. I received this fellowship after contracting with the Alliance. I am now sitting in NYC working on my own project.

I was able to apply for a scholarship to attend a forum in Rio de Janeiro directed towards the youth and was given an all expense paid trip. Here I met youth from all over the world and we are all very close now. One memory I will never forget is meeting my Brasilian twin: Mariana because she asked me what my favorite movie is and we both found out that we shared a passion for Dead Poets Society. If I had to select one quote to pick out from the movie and tell others about would be " We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.

To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?" Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play *goes on* and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be? " because it is a youth call to action and it demonstrates the interdependence of the human race.

I now talk to youth I met in Rio quite often, mostly through Facebook. This forum taught me that I have more brother and sisters in the world than I could have expected. These youth mean the world to me and I look forward to traveling to their home countries.

I am now studying leadership theory, religion, and my main area of study is English with concentrations on rhetoric and composition, poetry, and the interdependence/community construct of literature. Basically I like to study about anything and everything, which is why a liberal arts education works out for me. I will also be my college's Diversity Delegate this year, so I take multiculturalism very seriously because I believe that each culture ought to be understood on its own without any misconceptions or stereotypes.

As I said I am now in NYC and it is my project to create a North American Youth Network. The purpose of this network is to link organizations serving youth or led by youth in North America. This region is the only one that is not unified on issues of cross-cultural understanding or religious understanding. We do not have a representative on the Global Youth Advisory Committee and it is sad for me because I am proud to be from North America. We are afforded many more opportunities than some of the brothers and sisters I connected with in Rio and yet they overcome their adversity by youth mobilization.

What I am in the process of doing is finding organizations that match our objectives, contacting them and discussing the Alliance, showing that each individual organization has a youth voice to contribute, and creating a booklet from the youth perspective. Too often the UN creates these very pretty pamphlets from the official workers perspective, but this one has photos by youth as well as youth quotes. Once we have a network the network will have regional representatives who will nominate a North American Youth Representative to sit on the Youth Advisory Committee. Current committees are Asia, Pacific, Europe, Latin America, OIC countries, Africa, and North America, Spain and Turkey, are to be determined.

If you would like to read more about the youth portion of UNAOC the website is www.unaocyouth.org. I am also working on new additions to this website.

~Sarah McCune

Posted Tuesday, July 20, 2010