What kinds of community service opportunities are possible through I*EARN?

The premise of I*EARN is that the Internet can be used as a tool to enhance education, not only in the cognitive aspect, but also in terms of helping to develop values, critical thinking and attitudes about participation in the community. By creating multicultural, on line communities, students can be empowered to be pro-active in their communities in issues of democracy, class, gender, human rights, ethnic differences and environmental preservation. By creating the habit of getting involved in issues that are relevant to them, kids and teenagers will hopefully be better equipped for future citizenship participation.

On line communities share many characteristics of physical communities, even if their members are geographically dispersed. The members in these communities have a common interest and make up for the physical absence by creating distinct patterns of communication via e-mail. Instead of bodies and proximity, communities on line invent visible language that will do the things needed to build community.

I*EARN projects allow students to reflect and dialogue on their local and global communities. Students are often inspired by these projects to take action: cleaning up a local pond, sending blankets to hurricane victims, or letters of solidarity to victims of violence. The I*EARN global network of schools makes it possible to for students to look outside, as well as inside their community, for solutions.

The following are examples of I*EARN projects that can serve the purpose of promoting community action:

The Somalia Project- Students in the United States, Australia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Canada, and Saudi Arabia are collaborating on the aims of: 1) Providing a meaningful experience of cross-culture, friendship, and the community spirit of co-operation, giving and receiving, that is so congruent with I*EARN, and 2) Assisting struggling Somalian schools with funds and supplies. Through their efforts, they have established communication and a link with Somalian schools so that the students can become part of the I*EARN community.

The Stop Violence / Conflict Resolution Project-The project is designed to stimulate in-depth discussion of the causes of violence and ways of addressing and preventing it. As part of the project, high school students in Argentina developed conflict resolution workshops to outreach to students in their local elementary schools, and worked with a local radio station to

Comfort Quilt- As part of the 1999 I*EARN Global Art project "A Sense of Caring". The theme focuses on communicating how we care about one another in our school, families, community and world and how we can care more for one another. By the end of April, artwork and writing was exchanged with schools in Russia, Australia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and the United States (Oregon and Washington). The children use email to respond to the artwork and writing sent by other schools. A caring connected with this year's Global Art Theme was in response to the hurricanes last fall that hit Puerto Rico and Nicaragua. The class had been in email with children in Puerto Rico about the hurricane recovery. The class made comfort quilts and sent them to Puerto Rico to comfort children in shelters. One of the quilts went on display in the Children's Museum in San Juan with photographs and writing by the children in our class. We have just posted a website for the Puerto Rico comfort wuilt story and are still doing some editing on it. Several of the children helped construct this website as their first introduction to creating websites.

The Nicaraguan Rope Pump Project- In rural villages in Nicaragua, many children and adults are subject to disease and death because of lack of access to clean water. Through the Rope Pump Project, students collaborate with an organization called El Porvenir ("The Future") which works on small water projects in Nicaragua. Students in I*EARN have raised over $10,000 to fund the digging of wells and the installation of rope pumps in villages where people were drinking from polluted streams or from wells that had been contaminated by dirty buckets being thrown into them.

Humanitarian Project - Each year, as part of the First Peoples Project, a Humanitarian Project is launched. The project began in 1996-97, when participating I*EARN teachers in Australia sent a video of the children behind the Indigenous Arts Project. Students in Zuni, New Mexico were shocked to see the impoverished conditions under which Karen children-members of a minority group from Myanmar-live in Thailand. Students at A:shiwi Elementary School in Zuni, New Mexico (USA), Choctaw Tribal Schools in Mississippi (USA), and Koorie students at Bairnsdale Secondary College in Bairnsdale, Victoria, (Australia) worked jointly to raise almost $3,000 (US). Many individual I*EARN members also contributed to the 1997 fund raising effort. With the money raised last year, the Karen village received a generator for their school, wall siding for their dormitory, blankets for all the children, school supplies, kitchen supplies, and other necessities. Siriluck Hiri-O-tappa, an I*EARN teacher at the Bangkok International School, coordinated the purchase and delivery of materials in Thailand.

"Schools De-mining Schools" - a project launched by the UN CyberSchoolBus & I*EARN which harnesses the power of the internet to bring together learning and action in the real world. Students not only learn, discuss and publish, but actually and concretely contribute to solving one of the most horrifying problems of our times: the scourge of landmines. Participating schools help to rid another school of mines and contribute to the care of mine victim-survivors by launching a Mine Awareness campaign and raising funds.

Disaster Relief - I*EARN's ability to quickly reach thousands of people in its international community make it an effective tool to mobilize support for local emergencies. Two examples of this were: the Flood in Sabah, Malaysia and Poland-Czech Republic Flood Relief, and Hurricane Relief in Honduras and Puerto Rico.

Youth Volunteerism and Service -This project encourages youth from all around the world to define "youth volunteerism and service" in their own cultural and social context, and to share what they are doing personally as volunteers.