Minutes for Thursday, 30 October, 2008

Recorded by: Sharielle Applewhite

1. Discussed the UNESCO Conference last week and the feedback from what we thought of the conference.

2. Military Expenditures vs. Human Rights Expenditures information sheet was passed
out.

3. Updated the Ambassador contact sheet.

4. Discussed the UNICEF Legislative Reform Conference at the U.N. on November 18-19, 2008. The cost will be $75.00 and is due on November 13, 2008, and a check payment is preferable for administrative purposes. We will be leaving from the from the front of the Student Union by the bus stop. We will be leaving at 6:45pm on Tuesday night and won't return until late Wednesday night. We also confirmed who will be coming on the trip (Allison, Nikki, Julie, Teki, Stephanie, Sharielle, Pronoma, Jason, Rafael, Shefali, Simon, Erinn, Kara).

5. Rafael talked about the Ripples of Hope newsletter and asked for those who have helped outside of the U.S. to share the experience in the upcoming newletter. Therefore if there is anyone who wants to share contact Rafael.

6. The next soup kitchen is on Friday, 07 November 2008, and up to four volunteers can go if they don't have their own transportation. Ambassadors who went to the soup kitchen last time shared their experience and they were all positive and insightful.

7. Plans and ideas for new UNESCO t-shirts were discussed. There were ideas shared about color, sizes, type of clothing (hoodies, sweatshirts and etc). The cost was briefly discussed with a rough estimate being $13.00. The group on a whole discussed ideas, but so far no plans have been finalized.

8. The Mansfield Middle School project was shared with the group. Overall the workshops have been going well. The students at the middle school are very aware of issues. The teacher was very pleased with the workshops and suggested that there should be a little bit more interactive activities for the children. The plans for the next workshop were shared briefly.

9. Stephanie shared her action plan about collecting school supplies for children in Haiti. She shared a mission to collect backpacks for the children as well as school supplies and referenced Millenium Development Goal 2: Achieve primary education. Ideas were thrown out about ways to help accomplish this goal (exp: UConn students could donate school supplies and backpacks). Several Student Ambassadors offered to help with this project.

10. Kara suggested that we incorporate longer human rights education discussions in our meetings, perhaps once a month. Consensus from the group.

11. Birthdays that occurred during September, October and November were briefly celebrated with ice cream cake.

12. Ambassadors separated into their groups, either the FYE group or the Mansfield Middle School Culture of Peace group.