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So many times, I have spoken with passionate individuals about taking action for their cause. Often, it leads to sharing ideas and experiences. Many of my best experiences have been while lobbying my legislators and I always encourage people to try it. The first time I had the opportunity to lobby, I was excited and very nervous. I had once thought that lobbying was for professionals - people who were paid to pressure legislators to support causes or industries. It just seemed like an intimidating, overwhelming thing to take on.
Several years and lobbying visits later, I once again had an opportunity to lobby my legislators for comprehensive sex ed. at the 2009 Urban Retreat. I went on three lobbying visits. One to thank my legislator, Senator Brown, for supporting the REAL Act, one to drop off information, and one to educate an opponent of comprehensive sex ed.
It was at this visit, that I saw the incredible power of youth activists. I accompanied three Ohio young adults to meet with Congressman Robert Latta’s legislative aide. Rep. Latta is not a friend of comprehensive sex ed. His aide asked several good questions, though, of which the group easily answered - questions regarding funding, age-appropriateness, and curriculum.
Then the aide informed us that the Representative fully supports abstinence-only-until-marriage programming. In fact, she told us, there is a “great program, called The Ridge Project that does wonderful work in our area and is at risk of losing their funding.”
Without skipping a beat, one our Ohio Campus Organizers, and constituent of Rep. Latta’s, began to inform the aide of the program. “As a matter fact, Project Respect, a program of The Ridge Program comes to my high school. Last year, in my graduating class of 130 students, fourteen girls became pregnant. Clearly, this program does not work in our school.” *slam dunk*
With that, the aide thanked us for our time and assured us that she would share our information with the Congressman. It’s doubtful that this one visit will change the mind of this legislator, but hopefully after hearing many more personal stories of how abstinence-only mis-education has failed the youth of Ohio, he may see the light.
Because the dark reality is that 14 female students from this school in his district is about 11.5% of that graduating class. And those are only the pregnancies that our Campus Organizer knows of, not to mention the stats of STDs. In the meantime, I think Project Respect should add those statistics to it’s list.
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It may not seem like one lobby visit can make a difference, but the more people who make the effort to meet with their senators and representative, the more impact they can make. Good job!!
# Posted By Mahayana
| 9/28/09 06:44 PM
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Kudos to the group that went to this meeting b/c you did something perhaps just as significant as chaning their mind: scaring them.
# Posted By drs0043
| 9/28/09 09:47 PM
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So great! Thanks for sharing this!
# Posted By 
AFY_EmilyB
| 9/29/09 08:36 AM
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AFY_EmilyB
| 9/29/09 08:36 AM
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by Anatic09