Speaking Our Peace The Lilliputians
& the Giant
By Paul Olson, NFP President Global Warming Copenhagen: Games People Play
By Professor Bruce E. Johansen Volunteer Nebraska Peace Stratcom
The Most Dangerous Place on the Face of the Earth Whiteclay
Updates on Nebraska's tiny reservation border town. Goin' Broke Essay Winners
 Goin' Broke The Cost of War
 NFP Sticker Get Your FREE
NFP Bumper Sticker!
Just send us an Email.

A Smash Hit: Nebraska Student Organizing Conference 2008

Nic Swiercek
NFP State Board

When it comes to student activism, presidential election years bring out young veteran activists as well as birth new ones. While election campaigns create a flurry of involvement, the unfortunate problem is the swelling of activism tends to dissipate once election day passes.

Perhaps it’s a problem of orientation. Some see the election as an end in and of itself rather than only the beginning of more sustained efforts to pressure and hold politicians accountable. But it’s also a matter of how people believe change is made — whether it’s handed down from politicians, instigated from the grassroots, or is some mix in between.

The real challenge for students committed to long-term organizing efforts is to find ways to retain election year zeal past those first Tuesdays in November, as well as show students that fundamental change also requires sustained community organizing.

Seasoned student activists from the Progressive Student Coalition (PSC) at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln sought to host a regional student organizing conference to reframe how young adults conceptualize change and teach vital organizing skills that to assist them beyond the election.

The PSC, formed in the fall of 2006, is a loose-knit coalition comprising eight groups including Nebraskans for Peace-UNL, Students Advocating Gender Equity (SAGE), Queer Student Alliance (QSA), Students for Choice, Ecology Now!, Peers Encouraging Responsible Sexuality at UNL (PERSUNL), the UNL Young Democrats and the Campus Greens. The PSC seeks to build and maintain dialogue between progressive student organizations and work together in coalition toward common.

Throughout 2008, many students from PSC member groups took on a variety of campaigns. Scores of students led the charge in the fight for equal opportunity in Nebraska, organizing in communities and on college campuses across the state. Some lobbied the Unicameral for death penalty abolition and Sudanese divestment bills. Numerous students also took on leadership roles in Nebraska election campaigns for State Senate and the U.S. Congress, while many others worked for the Obama campaign in and beyond Nebraska — some of whom participated in the “Obama Organizing Fellowship” program last June.

PSC students wanted to share their experiences, keep this heightened activism going, and support and empower students throughout the region to become better organizers for their own efforts beyond this election cycle.

To that end the PSC hosted the first annual “Nebraska Student Organizing Conference” on Sept. 20, 2008, where young activists networked with other young progressives in the region, exchanged knowledge and insights, and learned valuable community organizing skills.

More than 125 young adults from across Nebraska and nearby states attended the conference representing Peace & Justice, women’s rights, gender studies, environmental, minority unions, diversity advocacy, LGBT, College Democrats and Greens, human rights, civil liberties, anti-domestic violence and bullying, and faith-based groups. Students in attendance came from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, Omaha, and Kearney, Creighton University, Doane, Dana, and Hastings Colleges, the College of St. Mary’s, the University of South Dakota, and various high students in Lincoln and Omaha. These students also networked with more than a dozen campaign and non-profit advocacy organizations that attended the conference.

Conference attendees participated in a series of interactive workshops led by student and veteran community leaders that educated students on particular issues as well as trained them in essential organizing skills. The workshops emphasized what students can do in their local community to effect change in and beyond the 2008 election season.

Attendees picked from 20 workshops spread across four sessions. Some issue-based workshops included Environmental Advocacy, Reproductive Rights, Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action, Death Penalty Abolition, Antiwar and Peace Organizing, Immigration Advocacy, Education Inequality, Poverty in Nebraska, and Race, Ethnicity, and Social Justice. Students learned organizing skills in workshops such as Planning Effective Mass Gatherings, Chapter Building and Organizational Sustainability, Networking and Coalition Building, Art and Activism, Navigating Formal Media, Running a Get-Out-the-Vote Campaign, and Running Young Progressives for Office, to name a few.

The PSC also integrated into the conference the UNL LGBTQA Resource Center’s Outspeaking training, which offered panel discussions and workshops on personal perspectives of LGBTQA experiences, effective public speaking, and creating safe and supporting spaces throughout the community.

Providing the keynote talk was Jonathan Tucker, a veteran youth organizer, poet and professional facilitator from Washington, D.C. who works with Operation Understanding DC and LevelTen. Tucker’s talk, “This is What Democracy Looks Like,” discussed the current state of progressive movements and the organizing challenges students face. Mixing in his compelling slam poetry, Tucker argued that democracy requires dissent, patriotism protest, and that our collective movement requires the leadership and dedication of young activists working toward a totalistic form of social justice.

In sum, the Nebraska Student Organizing Conference was a smash hit. At the end of day countless attendees eagerly inquired about the 2009 conference. Many expressed interest in more workshop sessions and a willingness to extend the conference over two days. Since September, progressive students from Nebraska colleges have built a contact network between their schools to continue to work together on current and future campaigns.

Due to the conference’s success and the hard work and dedication of the PSC’s conference planning committee, and with the generous donations from the Nebraska ACLU, Nebraskans for Peace, Nebraska Appleseed, Senator Danielle Nantkes, Senator Don Preister, and American Communications Group, the Progressive Student Coalition will host a second annual conference in the fall of 2009 at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.