Speak up.

How hard would you fight for your education? How far would you go? Would you go all the way to Afghanistan, submerge yourself in their lifestyle? Would you climb the hills barefoot with the children of Afghanistan? Sit in classrooms with holes in roofs, huddled together, no AC, no heat?

Children in a school in Afghanistan using donated school supplies (Photo by Greg Para)

The children of Afghanistan fight to get to school every day. Most of us in America would easily give up if it came to facing the same challenges.

Many people find themselves asking “who are we to interfere with another country?” and I did encounter a fellow student who asked me this…but who are we not to? When did we all of a sudden become too righteous to acknowledge the people suffering in another country, the children’s voices that have been silenced for too long? With hesitation, I too would raise my hand and agree that I once shared this view with my fellow student. Yet, this was before I educated myself, did my research, and mentally placed myself in a small school in the mountains of Afghanistan. No matter what your race, creed, or gender, as adults don’t we all hold responsibility for the children of the world? Don’t we owe them a better world than the one we were given?

This week Greg Para, a Naval officer from Sarasota, has returned from Afghanistan to visit home. He will be working with our class to bring school supplies to children in Afghanistan. During his visit home, he did many interviews; one article written by Charles Schelle for the Sarasota Patch can be found here. In class on Monday we discovered that Greg would be at USF to speak about his cause; it would be our responsibility to grab the attention of news reporters from different stations for this event. I was assigned Bay News 9. After submitting the story to Bay News 9, I stood by my phone for the rest of the day, checking my e-mail relentlessly, even calling to confirm they had received the story once. After 5p.m. had passed I lost all hope. To my surprise I received a response from Brian Jaeger, the assignment editor at Bay News 9. He explained that they were unable to make the speech, but wanted more information on the organization. I jumped up and down with excitement, as I had lost hope about 3 hours earlier. It seemed, though, that not all hope was lost and the world did care after all.

Each generation will leave its mark on the world; I sure do hope my generation leaves a positive one.

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