March 9th 2007 will see a range of events taking place on campuses throughout the UK to raise awareness of the situation in Darfur and prompt students to take action. We have several universities on board with this but we want you to join us. Please get in touch to organise an event at your university.
In order to make the day a big success across the country, we are working very closely with the newly fledged, Oxford based group: Hands Up For Darfur who recently launched and are holding a series of events in Oxford to raise awareness of what is happening in Darfur. We are working together to get students at as many universities as possible to organise an event on March 9th to raise awareness of the situation in Darfur and launch new Aegis Societies.
The rationale for this national attempt is twofold. Primarily we are working as always to raise awareness of Darfur’s very current tragedy and secondly this will be our first national, unified day of solidarity with the victims in Darfur. We hope you will use this event as an opportunity to raise the profile of the situation in Darfur and to join with us in condemning and taking action against genocide by starting an Aegis Society at your university.
The event you organise can take any form and doesn’t have to involve massive amounts of work. Your efforts, whatever they may be, will be greatly valued not only by Aegis Students and Hands Up For Darfur, but most importantly you will give hope to the many Darfuris who have nothing and in doing so, demonstrate that we will not let the rape, torture and murder of innocent, defenceless civilians take place without making noise about it and speaking out on their behalf.
An event can take any form; there is no specific formula that we are asking you follow, just to ensure that people leave your event with the following five things:
- Knowledge of what Genocide is
- Knowledge of what is happening in Darfur
- An action they can take – petitions, writing to MP, Divestment etc
- Knowing who Aegis Students are and what we do
- Feeling empowered to take action
We have resources ready to help you organise and publicise your event so please email us and we will assist in any way we can. If you would like to arrange for a survivor from Darfur to speak then this is certainly something we can help with. Contact: campaigns@aegisstudents.orgThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it via the Contacts Page
Hands Up For Darfur have created an excellent pack which gives lots of ideas for events and helpful advise on organising and promoting your event – this is a great step by step guide on how to get your event running. Once you have everything in place, contact your student, regional and if possible national media and ask them to cover your event.
We are urging all students to take this opportunity to make a difference and really work to make it succeed. The atrocities taking place in Darfur require urgent attention and we must do all we can to help bring an end to the violence. Even if all you have time to do is speak out by writing an article for the newspaper or a letter to your MP you will have helped make a difference.
Do not let this opportunity pass you by, do not force yourself to look back in 10 or 12 years time and think; “I wish I had done more to help stop the genocide in Darfur”
Do something now!
9th of March: Put the date in your Diary, start organising and get in touch with us.
