A passion for justice motivated four Loyola students to spend their Valentine's Day weekend in Washington, D.C. for the third annual Student Campaign for Child Survival National Conference.
From Friday, Feb. 11 to Sunday, Feb. 13, 34 members from more than 10 Student Campaign for Child Survival chapters across the United States attended lectures, workshops and advocacy training seminars to prepare them for lobbying on Capitol Hill on Feb. 14.
SCCS is a national grassroots movement that advocates for children's health worldwide by raising awareness and promoting better policies regarding child survival.
The four Loyola students who attended the conference paid the conference fee, but the Arrupe-King fund paid for their airfare, and they stayed with students at Georgetown University. The Arrupe-King fund supports events that address social justice and human diversity programming at LU.
During this year's conference, the students lobbied congressmen to support and introduce legislation concerning debt relief and the Global Fund.
These two issues are related to child survival. Debt relief is particularly prominent right now since President Bush supported it.
According to JubileeUSA.org, debt relief is defined as giving aid to impoverished nations that spend 40 percent of their gross national product on paying back interest on loans.
Most of the countries have paid back more than the original amount of their loans, especially in Africa. Because of high interest and bad economic polices set by the International Monetary Fund/World Bank, many countries eventually are paying back three times the original loan amount.
The Global Fund is the second initiative because it focuses directly on helping those with AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. SCCS is concerned because malaria is one of the five highest causes of death for children. Representatives from organizations such as UNICEF, Jubilee USA, Children's Defense Fund and Oxfam were present at the conference and spoke to the students on issues related to the health of children worldwide.
Students learned about debt cancellation, fair trade, U.S. foreign assistance and the Millennium Development Goals set by the United Nations.
The trip was senior Pam Bonsu's fourth time attending an SCCS conference and her second time lobbying in D.C. with SCCS. Bonsu, founder of the Loyola SCCS chapter, said the conference is a "great networking tool" because students can learn about the different organizations related to child survival and possibly get an internship with one of them.
Overall, SCCS members said they felt they received a positive response from the congressmen. Junior Hanna Kim said she enjoyed being able to advocate child survival by supporting international aid and debt relief.
"As we prepared for lobby day and learned about [the JUBILEE ACT and the Global Fund] I really felt they were assertive [requests] but reasonable," Kim said. "And I really believe [our lobbying] is going to work."
SCCS also secured bipartisan support for the CHILD ACT, for which Save the Children has been seeking initial sponsors, according to the coordinators.
For more information on the Student Campaign for Child Survival, contact sccsloyola@yahoo.com or visit www.supportchildsurvival.org.
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