The next session will be an in-person session in Hollywood on Monday, May 24th at 7:00pm. Because it’s held in a private home, we don’t give out the address unless you RSPV to stewart.kara@gmail.com.

RESULTS LA Basics Training Session 1

1. Learn who your representative is.

Once you learn his or her name, take a moment before you do anything to browse through your rep’s website, especially the bio section. Then find out what committees he or she is on. Just get a general idea of what is important to your rep and to the constituent base. Keep your request in the back of your mind. Have you learned anything about your rep that you think would make it either easier to get a “yes?”

2. Find out the name of your representative’s Aide for Foreign Affairs.

From the RESULTS Elected Officials Page, find your representative and click on “staff.” It’s always good to call the office and make sure the information is accurate before you start.

3. Send your request via email to the aide.

As you get ready to send your e-mail with your specific request, make sure the information you want them to receive is in the body of the e-mail, since their spam filters can be quite brutal with attachments. The RESULTS website has great coaching on writing a good e-mail. The best bet is to keep it short and to the point. (Think Hollywood but without the sequins. They don’t got all day.)

4. Call the aide directly to follow up.

Just call with a friendly check-in to make sure they got your e-mail. If you leave a message and they don’t call back within a day, try again every day or so until you get confirmation that they know who you are and what you’re asking for.

5. “Checking with the boss” or: purgatory.

If you’re satisfied that they know who you are and what you’re asking for, they’ll likely say something like, “I’ll check with the boss and let you know what she says.” Now it’s time to be courteous and treat the aide like you would any business contact. Give them a few days before checking back, but keep the conversation going until you get a yes or a no. Just don’t let it go too long between check-ins. You need a yes or a no.

If you get a YES – let us know so we can celebrate!

If you get a NO – get in touch with a local RESULTS leader to help you formulate a new strategy.

Happy lobbying!

Some of my favorite resources for getting started:

HOW TO: Build a relationship with your congressional aide

HOW TO: Make a phone call to your member of congress

HOW TO: Send an e-mail to your member of congress

See all RESULTS Activist Milestones

Angela Benson-McDaniel teaches 1Goal's Lesson For All to her Los Angeles 5th Graders.

I just came from visiting with a group of 5th graders at Normandie Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles. Their teacher, Angela Benson-McDaniel, is leading them in an Earth Day science lesson planting cilantro, poppies and petunias. Along with cleaning up the earth this month, these kids are taking on another of the world’s most daunting problems – the 75 million children who cannot attend school.

Angela is using curriculum called “Lesson For All” created by 1Goal, “a campaign seizing the power of football to ensure that education for all is a lasting impact of the 2010 FIFA World Cup.”

On Tuesday, I’ll get to join the kids again and watch them perform skits about global education for other classes.

Critical Timing: Historic Education Announcement Next Week

This coming Wednesday, a press conference call will take place announcing historic legislation that will help pave the way toward reaching Millennium Development Goal #2: achieving universal primary education by 2015.

Tomorrow, Saturday 4/17, these same, hard-working fifth graders will be attending Community Services Unlimited Earth Day where they’ll unfurl an enormous 1Goal banner for the people to sign in a show of support. There will also be a chance for community members to sign letters to congress supporting the Education For All legislation. The community-wide event takes place from from 11am – 6:00pm at Normandie Avenue Elementary School, 4505 S. Raymond Ave, LA, CA 90037 (enter from the Vernon gate).

1Goal’s campaign has drawn worldwide attention and the support of important public figures such as Queen Rania of Jordon, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, entertainers including Jessica Alba, Bono, Kevin Spacey, and scores of soccer players throughout the world. See a full list of 1Goal Ambassadors and supporters here.

Watch this blog or the Global Fund for Education Facebook Page to hear more about this important legislation and whatever you do – Join 1Goal today!

• A child born to an uneducated mother is twice as likely to die before age 5 than if the mother had an education. (RESULTS.org)
• According to Save the Children, across society, every year of schooling decreases a male’s chance of engaging in violent conflict by 20 percent. (RESULTS.org)
• Improving the health of adolescent girls in the developing world is the key to improving maternal and child health, reducing the impact of HIV, and accelerating social and economic development. (Start With A Girl: A New Agenda For Global Health)

One Southern California RESULTS partner has a family member serving in the US military in Afghanistan. His unit has been coordinating the troops’ distribution of school supplies and toys to Afghan children in the Kabul area (the supplies are donated by private citizens here in the U.S.) He sent these photos he took at an Afghan school for girls that has enrollment of 2500 children (they teach 3 shifts of children per day to accommodate that number of kids).

The demand for education is overwhelming.

Today, 75 million children, more than half of them girls, are out of primary school.

776 million adults are illiterate.

226 million adolescents will never attend secondary school.

If we rely on private donations, we will be waiting a long time to see this gap filled. We need to tell our national leaders that this is the way to real change.

Watch for more information from RESULTS for ways you can help promote this important campaign move forward, or TAKE ACTION NOW by helping to start the conversation in your local media!

See more photos on our Facebook Fan Page!

Ways To Connect:

1. Attend Local Events like the Yale Club of Southern California’s Empowering Women Through Microfinance event coming up on April 28th at UCLA. (Watch this blog, the RESULTSsocal Facebook page for more!)

2. Subscribe to the Los Angeles Microfinance Network blog.

3. Watch for screenings of Bonsai: Celebrating the Vision of Muhammad Yunus by local filmmaker Holly Mosher.

4. Join MFI Connect (what I like to call “Facebook for Microfinance Enthusiasts”) where you can find out about jobs, events and projects around the world, learn the basics by joining groups like “Microfinance: A Self-Guided Tutorial and Discussion Forum for Smart People” or stay in touch with us locals by joining the Southern California group!

5. Learn about some local microfinance projects like Los Angeles, LDC, Inc. Microcredit Access Projects.

Take Action to Advance Microfinance Now!

Awareness of the success of microfinance is growing, but it’s not a household word yet. There are still members of congress and their staff members who don’t know what it is. Please help award Muhammad Yunus the Congressional Gold Medal so that he can address a joint session of Congress and educate our leaders and fellow citizens.

Learn what simple steps you can take to help make the Yunus Gold Medal a reality!

San Diego IndieFest VI
Feed Your Mind, Free Your Muse
A PROJECT OF RESULTS, San Diego
a grassroots lobby for the end of hunger and poverty

March 26 – Films ONLY
March 27 – Films & EVERYTHING else!
Noon to Midnight

Over 100 Artists & Films on 7 Stages in North Park/San Diego, on & off University Ave. between Kansas and Ohio.

Wildly diverse & exciting independent Music, Film, Art, Business and Ideas all day long, featuring:

Rock, Hip Hop, House, Folk, World, Country, Funk, Punk, Jazz, Latin, Electronica, Spoken Word, Film, Photography, Dance, Painting, Poetry, Indie artisans selling handmade creations, interactive art, beer gardens, kids play areas, poetry share, voter registration,delicious food and drink and endless inspiration…

~ All Ages Welcome ~

http://www.SanDiegoIndieFest.com

http://www.SDIndieMusicFest.com http://www.MySpace.com/SDIMF
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Fortunately, not everyone is willing to abide by the notions of safety in sameness. The people who push the creative envelope whether in art, music, politics, or even business, do their fellow man a great service by adding facets of what’s possible in life…”
-John Rippo, Editor -
The Espresso, Aug. 2006

“Feminist driven, bursting with talent: Preview one of the largest, most important civil acts of 2007.”
- Jen Ftanzen /Lavender Lens, Feb. 07

“It’s an honor and a pleasure to be invited to perform my spoken word at the SD IndieFest. I honestly cannot think of any other festival that has a tenth of the devotion to independent music, art and thought. By its very nature, putting on a festival like this is an uphill battle – but an important battle; dare I say a CRUCIAL battle.”~Ed Decker-Writer/Poet

“Executive Producers, Danielle LoPresti (frontwoman /Danielle LoPresti & The Masses) and Alicia Champion (Champ Records/ Durga Sound) are two women who believe in letting the entities speak for themselves when demonstrating the relevance and importance of independent music, art, business and thought. But San Diego Indie Music Fest is about much more than even this. It is a coming-together of cutting-edge ideas, outreach, progressive activism and diverse art of all kinds; including film, dance, visual art, poetry, crafts, body and psychic arts and more – all designed to ignite and inspire.”
- DiscoverSD.com

“Not only did we have a successful event, your staff was the most supportive of any event we have ever been involved with. Kudos to all for a great time.” -Lonnie Reams/ CODEWEAR Clothing

“The San Diego IndieFest is my bread and butter every year. There is no concert where the fans are more excited to hear me, and there are no shows in which I sell more CD’s. IndieFest is my favorite show of the year.” -Josh Damigo / Artist

West Los Angeles (Culver City)

San Fernando Valley (N Hills)

Silverlake

Hollywood

South Orange County

San Gabriel (Diamond Bar)

March 24th is World Stop TB Day.

I have been working with an ad hoc committee with members from the CA TB Controllers, TB Prevention Partnership, and Breathe California. We are putting together a state-wide media call that highlights the success in California in bringing TB case counts down while emphasizing our continuing problem:

Threats to continued adequate funding jeopardize the maintenance of the infrastructure needed to keep the numbers low and to drive them even lower in our fight to control and eventually eliminate TB.

History has taught us that as soon as the number of TB cases starts to decline, funding plateaus and then reduces. We cannot continue to win our fight against TB, especially with the emergence of drug-resistant strains and easy transport of TB across borders, if flat funding continues or further cuts occur. The reservoir of TB infection in California ensures that we must maintain our infrastructure to control TB, or lose control and see a resurgence, or worse. We cannot let the infrastructure crumble, since TB anywhere is TB everywhere.

RESULTS Educational Fund has provided us a mini-grant to support a statewide media call from 10:30 AM to 11:15 or 11:30 AM on Tuesday, March 23rd. The following people will be on this call:

• Ernesto Jaramillo, World Health Organization Technical Officer
• James Watt, M.D., M.P.H., California State TB Controller
• Frank Alvarez, M.D., M.P.H., Private practitioner in Los Angeles
• Rachel Orduno, former TB Patient and Patient Activist with TB PhotoVoice project

TAKE ACTION NOW!

We would like your help in stimulating news stories in your area by promoting local media outlet participation on this call. Early next week I will provide you a Media Advisory and a Laser talk to support your inviting your local media. Please plan to invite your media between March 15 and March 19, with reminder calls on Mar 22 and the morning of Mar 23. You may have been among the CA RESULTS folks who supported a similar call for World Stop TB Day in 2006 and 23 media outlets around the state were on that call.

In the next few weeks, please make an effort to educate your local, state, and federal decision makers about the continued need for a strong public health infrastructure domestically and globally to effectively control TB. With the help of your local partners, share with them local media articles generated around World Stop TB Day, facts about TB in your community and around the world.

We will be supplying you with media packets and other information as it is released. Please email me at bruce@preville.net if you have media contacts and want to get involved or have questions.

Best, Bruce

I think it would be helpful to take the idea from

the general = Lobbying Congress (Sounds hard and scary – easy to put off when we’re busy)

to the particular = Forming deep and lasting relationships with our particular representatives in congress

The goal = To get our reps to see us as a vital source of information about issues related to global or domestic poverty and feel accountable to us where these issues are concerned because of our work with their offices, the media and the community.

What this relationship isn’t:

Warm and fuzzy. We’re not working to get our representatives’ approval and make sure we’re all best buddies.

What this relationship is:

More like our relationships with people we supervise at work. Ken Patterson, the RESULTS Global Grassroots Manager, came to LA and did a series of talks to our groups. He talked a lot about how we have to see ourselves in more of a supervisory role – that too often, we put them into the position of ultimate power in the relationship when we are the ones who voted them into their current job. We wouldn’t be good supervisors if we just sent an occasional email indicating our approval or disapproval for their work. We can’t do a good job as supervisors unless we actually know who the person working for us actually is. What makes her tick? What are his work habits?  How do I get her to participate as an effective team member in the fight against global and domestic poverty?

They also need to know us well enough to understand the consequences of not doing their jobs well.

The fruits of our relationship-building efforts:

I wasn’t very excited about anything with the word politics in it when I started. But I did understand building relationships, friendships even. Now my rep (and his staff) knows my name and hopefully knows me as “the microcredit girl.” He knows that a very particular someone in his district is holding him accountable. When I go to his town-hall meetings and open house events, he recognizes me and knows exactly what issues I represent.

It’s important to sign on to petitions that we truly believe are important. But just remember, the corporate lobbyists aren’t relying on petitions. They’re in our representatives’ offices every day pushing their agendas. The poor don’t have corporate lobbyists. They have us. Let’s go the extra step.

Sam Daley-Harris will be speaking on Sunday morning to motivate these empowered women with practical solutions to the problems of global and domestic poverty. We’re thrilled and honored to work with Marianne and her amazing team. If you haven’t signed up to attend Sister Giant, visit Marianne’s website to learn more and register!