From: Kids Can Make A Difference <kids@kidscanmakeadifference.org>
Date: September 2, 2010 5:59:31 AM PDT
To: Barby Ulmer <odw@magiclink.net>
Subject: Important News From KIDS

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Contact:

Ed Gragert 
Phone: 212.870.2693 
ed@us.iearn.org

Innovative Program Engaging Young People in Addressing Hunger Issues

Reaches Spanish-speaking Education Communities

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“Finding Solutions To Hunger: Kids Can Make A Difference®” Teacher’s Guide is translated 
into Spanish

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New York—Young people often ask how they can address such global issues as hunger and poverty. The issues are so huge and they are only individual students. Through resources created by “Kids Can Make A Difference® (KIDS),” middle and high school students can explore hunger issues collaboratively. KIDS has been known for its 255-page comprehensive teacher’s guide “Finding Solutions To Hunger: Kids Can Make A Difference.” Now through a partnership with the global iEARN network, this valuable resource is also available in Spanish. “Encontrando Soluciones al Problema de Hambre: Los Niños Pueden una Diferencia” is now available. Both the English and Spanish versions are available at KidsCanMakeADifference.org.

Through the linking of KIDS with iEARN-USA, students can use this resource in collaborative online project work with global peers—putting hunger into a global context. A new project within iEARN called “Finding Solutions to Hunger,” will be launched in September 2010 to run through June 2011. Each participating teacher will receive a free copy of this resource, in English or Spanish.

Another resource in the project will be a new online film fromWhyHunger, “The Food and Climate Connection: From Heating the Planet to Healing It” The video highlights the impact of today’s global food system on the climate and how a community-based food movement around the world is bringing to life a way of farming and eating that’s better for our bodies and the planet.

“iEARN-USA is pleased to be able to offer the Spanish version of “Finding Solutions” to its member educators, as a classroom resource in online collaboration worldwide, sharing stories of how students are finding solutions and taking action,” pointed out Ed Gragert, iEARN-USA Director. “After reading about a global issue and becoming committed to addressing it, students then can work online in iEARN’s Collaboration Centre with peers throughout the world to share ideas on finding solutions. This interaction enhances learning through technology and magnifies collective student impact,” he added.

"When we think of the KIDS program, we can recognize that it does good work in at least three regards. First, it helps to solve problems of hunger and poverty, laudable goals in their own right. Second, by helping kids see the importance of helping others, it encourages a value system at odds with the consumer culture in which we live. Finally, the types of values encouraged by KIDS may actually help improve the quality of its participants’ lives, making teens happier and better adjusted. What more could one ask?" notes Tim Kasser is Assistant Professor of Psychology at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois.

“iEARN enables young people to go beyond learning about the world, to learning WITH peers around the planet by using connective technologies. Instead of just a few students who are able to physically visit another country, the entire class can have personal and educationally valuable experiences with other cultures,” Gragert points out. Educators can integrate secure and safe student interaction into their science, literature, social studies, language arts, creative arts and other curriculum activities.

About iEARN

iEARN was launched in 1988 as a pilot project between the US and USSR to demonstrate that students could use emerging new technologies to work together on meaningful educational projects that enhance the quality of life on the planet. It is iEARN’s vision that students who start working together globally from the earliest ages will: 1) enhance their learning because it is experiential and interactive with their peers in other countries, and 2) realize that the world’s issues can be resolved by collaborative solutions. The iEARN network (ages 5-19) has grown to become the world’s largest educational network for project-based learning, with programs in 130 countries. iEARN-USA was awarded the 2003 Goldman Sachs Foundation Prize for Excellence in International Education and is a 2004 Tech Museum Laureate winner for “technology benefiting humanity.” Please visit iearn.org andus.iearn.org or e-mail: iearn@us.iearn.org. iEARN-USA is based in New York City.

About Kids Can Make A Difference® (KIDS)

Kids Can Make A Difference® (KIDS), an educational program founded in 1994 for middle- and high school students, focuses on the root causes of hunger and poverty, the people most affected, solutions, and how students can help. The major goal is to stimulate the students to take some definite follow-up actions as they begin to realize that one person can make a difference. When first developed, KIDS was originally targeted to students from middle-class and more affluent homes. We have since learned that KIDS provides an enormous benefit to young people living in less fortunate circumstances; for them, the realization that being poor is not their fault is a liberating notion. The KIDS program consists of three major components: (1) The innovative teacher guide, Finding Solutions to Hunger: Kids Can Make A Difference, (2) newsletter, and (3) the KIDS web site. KIDS is based in New York City.

About WhyHunger

WhyHunger is a leading advocate for innovative, community-based solutions to hunger and poverty. WhyHunger challenges society to confront these problems by advancing models that create self-reliance, economic justice, and equal access to nutritious and affordable food. WhyHunger is based in New York City.