Girls start campaign to end genocide in Africa

John Witherspoon School students launch letter-writing campaign at Princeton Public Library.

By: Rachel Silverman
   Somewhere, over on the remote, desert-swept plains of Africa, an unspeakable human tragedy is at play.
   Over the past two years, close to 180,000 civilians have reportedly died and millions more have been displaced by Western Sudan’s brutal ethnic-cleansing campaign, in which government-backed militias have been systematically eliminating entire communities of African tribal farmers.
   Now, as the Sudanese people search for missing family members among the millions of silent, unmarked gravestones, the poverty-stricken nation is sounding a desperate cry for help.
   Their call struck a chord with two John Witherspoon Middle School students — seventh-graders Aislinn Bauer and Sarita Rosenstock — who recently have embarked on a letter-writing campaign to help save the Darfur region.
   "I took them to see Hotel Rwanda," Aislinn’s mom, Charlotte Hussey, said, describing the girls’ first exposure to the vexing, catastrophic issue of human genocide. "At the end of the film, they were pretty moved and pretty shocked by it.
   "They were really interested to learn what was going on," Ms. Hussey continued. "Something that struck them was the lack of response by the international community. They wanted to do something to keep the issue in the forefront of our government’s mind."
   So on Saturday, armed with paper and pen, the pair will set up shop at the Princeton Public Library in an attempt to galvanize the community into writing letters to Congress and President George W. Bush.
   "They just believe they are doing something that will make a difference," Ms. Hussey said. "They are not cynical or jaded. They are very horrified by what’s happening."
   The letter-writing initiative, which already has garnered more than 300 letters and $200 in contributions, also doubles as an education-outreach campaign.
   "They’ll be handing out green ribbons to raise awareness," Ms. Hussey noted. "The goal is twofold," she said. "It’s to get the letters signed and also to raise people’s interest and awareness."
   According to Teen Librarian Susan Conlon, who has helped coordinate the weekend event, this type of teen activism, while admirable, is hardly an anomaly in a community like Princeton.
   "We have a lot of middle and high school students who are very conscious about things going on in the world," she said. "We have an activist teen community here. They are involved with all different things. They are developing a sense of autonomy about how they see the world."
   The library, for its part, aims to foster a nurturing environment for such youthful curiosity and idealism.
   "One of the things we can do as librarians is to offer them the ability to find information," Ms. Conlon said. "We want to provide kids the support they need to do these things."