We Are Not Your Soldiers and World Can’t Wait is organizing speaking events for Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans at schools nationwide. Here’s what they wanted us to share:
We Are Not Your Soldiers tour to high schools and colleges
Invite us to your school or educational program. If you are not a student, parent or educator, pass this information on to someone who is. Call us at 646-807-3259 or email wearenotyoursoldiers@worldcantwait.net. Do it soon while we still have openings. We will arrange to get you a speaker, suited to the needs of your course/program requirements, either in person or via web hook-up.
- U.S. Army veteran John Burns
- Will Griffin, a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan, who directs the Peace Report and was just elected to the board of About Face (formerly Iraq Veterans Against the War)
We will arrange to be at your school no matter where you are geographically located.
If you are in the New York City area, we are scheduling for John and Will for the weeks of November 12th and November 18th. Joe is available in October, November and December.
During our school visits, veterans present their own personal stories of how they were affected by their time in the military within the context of U.S.wars, bringing another vision of the “war on terror” in which so many have been sacrificed by losing their lives and/or their humanity. We bring this exposure to a generation of youth that is largely unaware of what is being carried out around the world in their names.
At this time of growing awareness and activism among young people around the climate crisis, immigration and the Trump administration, we present another aspect which broadens and clarifies their understanding. While society is filled with violence and racism so many youth are seeking a different way of life.
When we go to a classroom, we engage in dialog where the students ask any questions and state their own opinions and thoughts. Utilizing critical thinking, students integrate information from different sources delineating and evaluating the arguments and claims to which they are exposed. However, students don’t have to believe what they hear in our presentations — we encourage them to investigate and do their own research. We work with the teacher to align the presentation with current curriculum.
Here we highlight a few of our speakers. Their availability, and the availability of our other speakers, depends on date, location and needs of the class.
“I continue to be so impressed by the leadership of Courage to Resist in building a broad movement to free Chelsea Manning.”
