Greenpeace

We recently welcomed 23 young people to our offices to spend 12 weeks with us on the Greenpeace Organizing Term (GOT).

This is the best organizing training program for students in North America and that’s why we receive thousands of applications each year to join. Those that are accepted spend a semester in either Washington, DC or San Francisco completing four phases of the training.

The first phase is comprised of a series of structured workshops introducing students to various aspects of Greenpeace campaigns, including recruitment drives, phone-banking, and messaging. Greenpeace often invites guest lecturers to talk to students, including communication experts and veteran organizers.

The second phase includes additional training and hands-on exercises in direct action and more advanced campaign tactics, including media outreach and Internet organizing. For the third phase of the term, students travel to work with Greenpeace campaigners across the world for what is known as the Greenpeace Expedition.

In the fourth and final phase of training, students work with other student leaders to execute campus-based organizing activities. Once they have completed the training, we stay connected with our alumni as they return to campus, through campaigns, through Student Coordinators, through the Student Network Board, and through additional trainings.

This semester’s GOT students have an exciting three months ahead of them. Today they are learning about campaigns that they will take to the streets to run this month and they are deciding what will be the best tactics to use to build support and win change.

We’ll keep you posted on how they get on!

I spent this afternoon in the company of 11 talented young people running a public speaking workshop. They are all students enrolled in our semester-long training program, the Greenpeace Organizing Term (GOT). The GOT is a semester program aimed at empowering and training students to become enviornmental leaders.

They are only only halfway through their second week with us and I'm impressed by how much they've learned already: they wrote and presented articulate, impassioned speeches urging each other to join the global warming fight.

In their first ten days with us, the students have already been through trainings in messaging, recruitment, facilitation and campaign strategy. They've also heard briefings from our seasoned campaigners on Oceans, Toxics and Global Warming. Their first weekend was spent together on a retreat getting to know each other and building a team that will take on vital environmental campaigns in the coming months.

They've already been pounding the streets, collecting public comments on global warming to pressure the the EPA to act boldly. Last night they hit the phones and persuaded hundreds of Greenpeace supporters to make a phone call to their Congressional reps about supporting the Chemical Security Act.

We're proud to be training and supporting the next generation of eco-activists. It makes a lot of sense to us. This is the generation that will feel the biggest impacts from the environmental decisions that are being taken today — and they feel strongly about having a voice in those debates. Through the GOT we support them with the knowledge and skills to be heard, to organize others, to build movements.

I can't wait to see what these students will do next...

If this sounds like something that you — or a young person you know — would love to be doing, then apply now for our Fall Semester program HERE.