On Wednesday, April 7, the ONE Campaign met in Crestview Hall to discuss the group’s initiative and try to make an organization on campus.
The ONE Campaign is a group designed to end poverty, particularly in Africa. Matt Sheffield, philosophy graduate, said he hopes to begin the organization at IU Southeast and gain student interest.
“It is a grassroots campaign and advocacy organization that’s backed by over 2 million people who are committed against fighting extreme poverty and preventable disease,” Sheffield said.
Sheffield said students can take actions such as signing a petition, contacting representatives and engaging with local media.
There is also a monthly Campus Challenge, a competition to get the student body more involved with the program.
“The ONE Campaign does such a great job with the ONE Campus Challenge and just basically making it really easy to make a difference,” Sheffield said.
“They just give you little things to help you make a big difference, and it’s fun to work in your community with other students,” he said.
In order for a group to become a student organization on campus there are a few requirements that must be met.
“At least 50 percent of our members who are signed up have to be IUS students,” Sheffield said. “We have to have a constitution written out, and we have to have at least five students who want to see this become an organization.”
Debbie Finkel, dean of research, is the adviser for the organization and said she wanted to become the adviser so she could feel like she was making a difference.
“I had been interested in it before, and I had kind of tried before to get campus interest,” Finkel said. “It needs to be students who are willing to have a student organization. If students are willing to do it then I am more than willing to be the adviser.”
The ONE Campaign is a collaboration of various organizations into one large group. Finkel said this way, instead of fighting each other for the same funds, now they can work together for the same issues.
“That’s where the ONE idea, the name, comes from,” Finkel said. “They are ONE big group, but it’s also that one individual can make a difference in small ways.”
Whitney Koopman, education freshman, said she heard about the organization through an e-mail sent out by Campus Life.
“I love helping out organizations whose goal is to end poverty and support those in need, so I thought I would see how ONE went about raising money for these people and the impact that they are making,” Koopman said.
Koopman said students should join because one person alone is not a large enough impact to end poverty.
“It is going to take awareness in order for this movement and organization to be successful,” Koopman said. “These people who are living in impoverished nations did not choose their situation, but we can come together to change their situation for the next generations.”
One of the students interested in becoming an officer for the ONE Campaign was Josh Kornberg, communications sophomore.
Kornberg said it will be a good way for students to get involved and give back to others around the world.
“ONE is a great organization that strives to promote social justice in areas of the world where it is desperately needed,” Kornberg said.
Sheffield also said students need to join because not only is it easy and fun, but it is also a good thing.
By CLAIRE MUNN
Staff Writer
clamunn@umail.iu.edu