YPAC in Action

YPAC is committed to helping you have your voice heard. You can see the work we do helping you contact your elected officials directly through our Web site, but a lot takes place behind the scenes as well. Here is a sneak peek:

We received an email from a woman looking for a "grassroots" group that would join her in asking Congress to reinstate Grandparents visitation rights. We quickly started working the phones, reaching out to YPAC member organizations. We found a number who were interested in working with this woman (as one organization said, "Hooray for YPAC! It's great to see this how this tool can energize both individuals and advocacy groups!"

We connected this woman with these organizations; here is her response: "Thank you so much! You have went above and beyond any other organization I have contacted. I truly appreciate your help and I will definitely keep you posted on any results."

Interested in making your voice heard? Want help? Email us at info@youthpolicyactioncenter.org!

What do you think of the new home page?

As best we can tell, most users come to the site, take action and then leave. That's fine -- more than fine, it is the reason we set up the site: to help you connect with your elected officials. But you can also use the site to learn more about the policies you are taking action on -- you can become an expert youth advocate! So we added a featured alert, featured success, and featured "Learn More" entry right on the home page, to give a taste of the content to be found within. What do you think? Any ideas for ways we could adjust the home page to make it even better?

A Victory in the Fight to End Domestic Violence!

Last week, the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) posted a call alert using the Youth Policy Action Center as part of an important campaign seeking sufficient funds for important Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) youth programs.

In a troubled fiscal climate where many important programs are suffering from budget cuts, the NNEDV campaign helped secure 25 million additional dollars for VAWA youth programs! This is a truly dramatic victory and we thank everyone who took action on this alert.

You may want to thank your Representative for his or her support in the fight against domestic violence!

What's that in the rear view mirror?

You -- the users of YPAC -- have sped past a major milestone. In less than three months since the re-launch of YPAC (April 18, 2006) , 2166 of you have already sent 5251 messages to your officials. This already surpasses the number which were sent in the entire first beta-year of the site! Keep your foot on the gas pedal, even greater things are ahead!

What a month!

It has been one month since the re-launch of the new YPAC (April 18, 2006). How we doing? The numbers speak for themselves.

In YPAC's first year (April 05-April 06): 2078 of you took action, sending a total of 4382 messages to your elected officals and media.

Since our launch, in just one month, 1270 of you have already taken action, and sent 2949 messages!

You are well on track to do more in two months than you did all of last year! Tell your friends how they can get involved as well (including your friends on MySpace, Essembly, Yahoo360, and Friendster).

Which brings up the question: what should be our goal? How do you, as a member of the YPAC community, want us to judge our collective success? Should we set an annual goal? 10,000 messages? 100,000 messages? 1,000,000,000 messages?

Look what you did!

Yesterday you collectively sent more than 350 messages responding to an alert posted by Mobilizing America's Youth, "Congress wants you off MySpace (and Facebook, and Friendster...)" Great work! This is the second highest daily total in the history of the YPAC (the highest daily total to date being more than 500 messages sent on June 23, 2005 in response to the alert "Say No to Federal Funds for Drug Testing.") We will keep close tabs on this social networking bill, and you can too -- we have added it as the featured bill on Billtracker.

You gave the media the REAL scoop!

Who says you can't make a difference? In the first week after the re-launch of the Youth Policy Action Center, more that 5,200 of you viewed more than 23,000 pages on the Web site, and sent nearly 500 messages to elected officials and media. That's right, media -- a number of you have figured out that the Youth Policy Action Center can be a powerful way to get your voice in print. The Campaign for Youth posted an alert about a graduation rate story in USA Today, and you responded, submitting more than 160 letters to the editor to papers across the country! Students for Sensible Drug Policy posted an alert about how many college applicants in each state have been denied financial aid due to drug convictions. You sent more than 160 letters to the editor, and look, here is one of them, which was printed as the lead letter in Sunday’s Providence Journal! Education Week took notice as well, reporting on the important work you all are doing through the Youth Policy Action Center.

What do you think of the NEW Youth Policy Action Center

April 18th, 2006 (our first anniversary!) marks the official re-launch of the Youth Policy Action Center!

This redesign is a direct result of feedback you -- site visitors -- gave on the first version of the site.

You told us that it was great to be able to take action at the federal level, but you also wanted to be able to take action closer to home, at the state and local levels. So we created state pages. We are really excited about this -- hope you are as well!

You told us that you wanted to learn more about child and youth issues, policies and how they are made. So we added up to date media stories about children and youth, the best available research and information, and a set of policy tools -- giving you access to the same information used by professional lobbyists.

You told us that sending messages to your elected officials was one way you wanted to participate in democracy, but there were others as well. We couldn't agree more! So we added opportunities to volunteer and to vote.

And you told us that you wanted to interact with other people on the site, to share ideas with others. So we added places for you to post and watch videos, to connect with each other and make new friends, and this blog so you can tell us what we should do next!

All this takes a lot of time and money -- the technology costs alone costs thousands of dollars a year. We'll need your help to stay on the air -- please donate today!

What do you think? We love to hear from you -- post comments to let us know what is working and what is not, and what additional features you would like to see!

--Thaddeus Ferber
Chair, Youth Policy Action Center