How to Be an Effective Advocate
Questions Individuals Can Ask:
- How informed am I about pending legislation which could affect world language and area studies?
- How often do I write to my senators and congressional representative(s) in Washington?
- When did I last write an advocacy letter?
- What have I done to support the efforts of word language teachers in my area and to publicize their successes?
- What role do I play in the advocacy work of the professional organization to which I belong?
- What contact have I had with elected representatives, local, state, and national?
- What resources do I have on hand to be an effective advocate?
Questions Associations Can Ask:
- How much do we publicize the status of legislation of pending issues of concern to world language teachers?
- What information do we provide so that teachers can get involved?
- How much communication does our advocacy team, task force or committee have with its members?
- What success stories can we tell?
- How connected are we to advocacy efforts of allied organizations and other world language association?
- What role does advocacy plan in our organization structure, our conference planning, and in the setting of our financial priorities?
Advocacy Ideas:
- Install an advocacy hotline.
- Host a large-scale activities fair which lets parents see their children’s success in world language-especially at the elementary/middle school level.
- Support world language programs through involvement in local, state, and national Parent Teacher Associations.
- Give sessions and presentations about world language study at the conferences of other educational associations such as Middle Schools and Social Studies groups.
- Volunteer to do programs or be a speaker for groups such as counselors, school board associations and associations for academic administrators.
- Consider hiring young, political science graduate students to work as “inexpensive” paid staff for advocacy work.