Conference Tracks
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The C.O.O.L. Idealist National Conference program is divided into "tracks," which help participants navigate the 14 three-hour Friday Forums and the approximately 150 90-minute workshops that take place during the weekend. Each track has a Friday Forum associated with it, which all take place the Friday afternoon of the conference. There are also a few "bonus" Friday Forums that are not attached to a track, and that can be found at the bottom of this page. Each track will also have workshops associated with it, which will take place on the Saturday and Sunday of the conference. Workshops at the conference will be evenly distributed throughout all of the tracks. Anyone is welcome to submit a proposal for a workshop - students, campus staff members, year of service members, nonprofit staff, faculty, community members, emerging professionals, and anyone else who is interested in speaking to a national audience about how we can all work to build a better world.
These tracks are broad themes that are deemed most interesting and useful to conference participants based on feedback from past attendees, the conference's Student Planning Committee, and the members of our Student Advisory Board. Conference participants can follow one track throughout the conference or attend workshops in many different tracks.
The track titles and descriptions are listed below, along with a few sample workshop titles, to help you get a sense of the possible content of each track. We hope this framework helps you take full advantage of all that the conference program has to offer. Please contact campusconference@idealist.org with any questions.
Globalization and Development: Encouraging Sustainability in a Changing World
Interested in learning about the impact of globalization on communities around the world? Curious about ways to contribute to community development in sensitive and sustainable ways? This track addresses the unique role of development initiatives in settings ranging from small villages to major cities around the globe. Workshops in this track might deal with everything from small town co-ops, to the debate over the Central American Free Trade Agreement, to the intertwining of environmental and economic justice.
- Sample Workshop Title: Getting Your Feet Wet in International Development
- Sample Workshop Title: Fair Trade - Another Model is Possible
Building Coalitions: Connecting People and Communities for Change
Working in coalition with others is an efficient and often necessary way to change communities for the better. Call it building bridges, forming alliances, cultivating relationships, or even that dreaded word
"networking"-any way you look at it, connections of all kinds inform and enrich our work. Workshops in this track will explore the tools, strategies, challenges, and opportunities inherent within the process of building both short-term and long-term coalitions to effect positive social change. Whether you coordinate a tutoring program, an issue-based campaign, or a regional network of student leaders, effective coalition-building and organizing will enhance and expand the impact of your work.
- Sample Workshop Title: Eating Crow for the Sake of Community - Collaborating with Former Adversaries
- Sample Workshop Title: Red Rover, Red Rover - Bringing Others Into Your Work
Service and Service-Learning: Changing the World by Serving and Learning with Others
Engaging in service has always been at the heart of this conference, but there are myriad ways that one can serve a community. Workshops in this track include best practices for successful service projects and alternative break programs that encourage students to reflect upon the broader implications of a service experience. This track also explores various forms of service-learning that bring the outside world into the classroom and revolutionize students' ownership of their education. Topics will range from the logistics of planning a "Day of Service" project, to the role of power and privilege in service and service-learning, to incorporating service into a study abroad experience.
- Sample Workshop Title: Serving With Your Head, Heart, and Hands
- Sample Workshop Title: Service-Learning - Doing Away With the Digital Divide
International Public Health: Enriching Lives by Improving Health
Across the world, students are mobilizing around health issues and working to place access to health care at the top of the international agenda. Geared toward students interested in exploring the connections between health, poverty, development, and justice, this track considers the influence that health and access to healthcare have on the world population. Workshops will cover everything from the relationship between poverty and global health epidemics to the politics of funding for HIV/AIDS education and treatment.
- Sample Workshop Title: Seniors Affecting Seniors - The Impact of Elder Health on College Students
- Sample Workshop Title: Food for Thought - World Population and Resource Distribution
Spirituality and Justice: Living Out Faith by Taking Action
Many religious and spiritual traditions have long histories of embracing and working toward peace and justice. This track explores ways to work toward justice in the world from one's own religious or spiritual perspective, as well as ways to take care of one's spiritual self while working for social change. It also examines the role of service and activism because of, in spite of, or in addition to one's religious or spiritual principles.
- Sample Workshop Title: "But I Don't Hate My Neighbor!" - Reconciling Faith and Justice
- Sample Workshop Title: Finding the Heart in Your Community
Leadership and Entrepreneurship: Guiding Others Creatively and Effectively
Believing in a cause is one thing; creating positive social change around that cause requires a complex array of strategies and skills. This track can help you: explore how to start an organization from scratch; breathe new energy and ideas into an existing initiative; or investigate revolutionary ways to combine the best of the private, public, and nonprofit sectors. It also involves teaching the "hard skills" - such as facilitating a meeting, program management, and fundraising - to prepare you for success. Beyond these tangible skills, participants will also explore topics such as leadership theory and giving direction to an entrepreneurial spirit.
- Sample Workshop Title: Social Entrepreneurship 101 - From Ideas to Action
- Sample Workshop Title: "It's Like Herding Cats!" - Meeting Management and Facilitation
International Human Rights: Standing Together with a Global Community
From the neighborhoods surrounding our campuses to countries in the far reaches of the globe, people continue to struggle for their basic human rights - food, shelter, health care, education, civic participation, and more. This track explores some of the issues involved in local, national, and international conversations about ensuring that these rights are afforded to every global citizen. Workshops may address everything from environmental racism, to action in prisons, to genocidal policies, to service worker movements.
- Sample Workshop Title: Getting Congress to Listen to You
- Sample Workshop Title: Queering the Classroom - Challenging Homophobic Violence and Bullying in Schools
Social Responsibility: Conscious Living in an Interdependent World
To what extent will your community involvement as a college student impact the way you lead the rest of your life? This track focuses on a broad variety of questions: How can you balance your values with your career plans? What decisions can you make to help preserve the world's resources, including the things that you buy and the foods that you eat? To what extent can you accomplish your goals by working for a nonprofit organization after graduation? Do voting and boycotting really work? Where does graduate school fit in? Workshops in this track will delve into the many questions and opportunities related to living a socially responsible life.
- Sample Workshop Title: Going Corporate and Staying Connected - Doing Good in Any Work Setting
- Sample Workshop Title: Greening Your Diet - Eating as a Revolutionary Act
Art, Media, and Social Action: Strengthening Voices Through Imaginative Means
Art and media have always been provocative voices in the midst of complicated conversations. Sometimes artists have been lauded for their social commentary; often they are ignored or cast aside. This track will address some of the ways that artists have managed to work for social change across issues and throughout generations (while paying the bills!), as well as some of the ways that media outlets affect social action. Workshops might include topics such as the power of mural arts programs, online activism, communications conglomerates, and guerrilla art.
- Sample Workshop Title: "Rock is Cool, but the Struggle is Better" - A Retrospective of Modern Musicians' Activism
- Sample Workshop Title: Translating Fury Into Action - Gender Stereotypes in the Media
Campus Administrators: Nurturing Yourself While Supporting Others
This track focuses on the unique role that campus staff and administrators play on their campuses, whether in the Community Service or Service-Learning Office, Career Services, an academic department, or a host of others. This track caters to professionals from all campus departments and programs, with some workshop options designated specifically for junior and senior administrators. Workshops will cover both concrete topics (such as building a service program on campus or writing an engaging meeting agenda) and more philosophical topics (such as how to engage students with whom you have ideological differences).
- Sample Workshop Title: The Joys and Challenges of Inter-Campus Collaboration
- Sample Workshop Title: Write for the Money! Grant Writing Basics from Funders to the Final Report
This year's "bonus" Friday Forums will be geared toward:
- Year of service members
- Students of color and their allies
- Junior-level administrators
- Senior-level administrators
Keep your eyes out in the fall for more information on these forums and all of the others!!
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