2008 Woodie Awards
Midd8 symposium attracts global attention
Liz Campbell
Issue date: 2/23/06 Section: News
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In response to a growing deficiency of student awareness and activism on the Middlebury College campus, a group of students is organizing the Midd8 Global Spring Symposium in order to increase student participation in global affairs and to enhance the role of young people in the future of the world. The symposium will take place from April 20 to April 22 and will be modeled on the Live 8 concerts, held in July 2005 to create awareness of poverty, and will seek to address the Millennium 8 Goals set out by the United Nations.
The idea for Midd8 originated after several College students attended a conference sponsored by Americans for Informed Democracy at Yale University over the summer. The conference aimed to bring together active students across the country for a day of workshops, guest speakers and discussions focused on techniques for raising global awareness in the United States.
Upon arrival at Middlebury in the fall, these students, led by Co-Directors Courtney Matson '06.5 and Divya Khosla '06, began planning an event that would increase activism on campus and throughout the College community.
"We were all really inspired by the conference, so we ended up meeting, and we all had the same thought - let's do something like this at Middlebury," said Matson. "We wanted to have the same sort of event, so we started out on a small scale. Since then, it's become this massive symposium."
The eight Millennium Development Goals - which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 - form a blueprint agreed to by all the world's countries and all the world's leading development institutions.
Focused directly on these eight goals, the symposium will include a first panel discussion on Thursday, April 20, that will discuss the actual goals, a second panel discussion that will investigate their implementation and a keynote speaker who will talk about their global importance.
The idea for Midd8 originated after several College students attended a conference sponsored by Americans for Informed Democracy at Yale University over the summer. The conference aimed to bring together active students across the country for a day of workshops, guest speakers and discussions focused on techniques for raising global awareness in the United States.
Upon arrival at Middlebury in the fall, these students, led by Co-Directors Courtney Matson '06.5 and Divya Khosla '06, began planning an event that would increase activism on campus and throughout the College community.
"We were all really inspired by the conference, so we ended up meeting, and we all had the same thought - let's do something like this at Middlebury," said Matson. "We wanted to have the same sort of event, so we started out on a small scale. Since then, it's become this massive symposium."
The eight Millennium Development Goals - which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 - form a blueprint agreed to by all the world's countries and all the world's leading development institutions.
Focused directly on these eight goals, the symposium will include a first panel discussion on Thursday, April 20, that will discuss the actual goals, a second panel discussion that will investigate their implementation and a keynote speaker who will talk about their global importance.