PROGRAMS : FIFTY WAYS of becoming an active citizen.

Volunteering

Volunteers are members of the community who freely give-up a few hours of their time every week to help a charity or club in their area in the general activities that they are doing to help them improve civic life.

Here are the first sixteen of the fifty ways in which you can become a more active citizen!

1.      Assist your local Youth Club with activities being organised.
2.      Nominate someone for the JCI Outstanding Young Person competition.
3.      Contact your local school to see if they need assistance running a project.
4.      Pay a visit to a local elderly person and ask is there anything you can do for them.
5.      Join your local resident's association.
6.      Start a Neighbourhood Watch programme.
7.      Visit senior citizens at a nursing home.
8.      Help cook and/or serve a meal at a homeless shelter.
9.      Walk dogs for your local animal shelter.
10.  Volunteer on a helpline.
11.  Teach at an adult literacy centre.
12.  Participate in a marathon for your favourite charity.
13.  Volunteer for a sports club.
14.  Register your details on the Volunteer.ie Website and start volunteering.
15.  Contact your local branch of Meals on Wheels and offer to help.
16.  Join your local Junior Chamber International (JCI) Branch.

Environment

Everyone is not lucky like me and able to live in the Internet so if we don’t start looking after our environment there will be no where for all the little citizens of the future to live. If you want to help our environment and start to become a more active citizen here are some of things you can do:

1.      Donate unwanted clothing and/or toys to a local charity shop.
2.      Get a green and a brown bin and set up a recycling system for your home.
3.      Donate unwanted books to your local library.
4.      Clean up rubbish along a river, beach, or in a park.
5.      Create a habitat for wildlife in your garden.
6.      Start a local group that will plant trees in your locality.
7.      Ask your local Tidy Towns Committee if they need assistance.
8.      Distribute "pooper scoopers" door to door in your area.
9.      Write a letter to your local politician asking them for their environmental policies and suggest some things that they could be doing.
10.  Turn the heating down by one degree in your house.
11.  Wash your clothes at 40 degrees and use environmentally friendly cleaners.
12.  Where possible buy your groceries from local suppliers and farmer's markets.

Civic

If you decide to pledge to do one of the actions from the Civic list it will not be long before you have a greater feeling of belonging in your local region.
From my experience it is hard to match the feeling you have after you have invested some of your precious time in making your area better. Here are some suggestions of things that you can do to help your communtiy.
1. Give up your seat for elderly or disabled people when travelling on public  transport.
2. Write to the Minister for Foreign Affairs about a humanitarian crisis, ask him what Ireland is doing to help and suggest what we could also be doing.
3.  Become active in your local political party.
4.  Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper about an issue you care about.
5. Organise a public issues forum for your community.
6. Vote in all local and national elections.
7. Take a friend to the polling booth to vote who would not vote otherwise.
8. Give blood.
9. Help a blind person cross the road.
10.  Join the Garda reserves / Reserve Defence Force / St John’s ambulance.
11.  Pledge to help Active Alfie!

Community Spirit
Community spirit is the key to a happy and functioning community area. Some would say that if your area has good community spirit everything in that community will run like a well oiled machine. People smile at each other walking down the street and they are happy to do selfless acts for their fellow citizens.

If you want to improve the community spirit in your area here are some of the things that you can do!!!

1.      Clean graffiti off your local community buildings.
2.      Plant flowers in public areas that could use some colour.
3.      Manage one of your local sports teams.
4.      Start a youth club in your area.
5.      Look after a neighbour’s pet while they are on holiday.
6.      Mentor a young person and help give them confidence in themselves.
7.      Help in developing tourism in your locality.
8.      Organise a social event in your area to get to know your neighbour.
9.      Organise a neighbourhood watch.
10.      If you see someone doing something good for the community be sure to thank them for doing some great work.
11.      Smile and have a nice word when you meet people on the street and everyone     will smile back at you.

Source : www.fifty-ways.com

NEWS : DECEMBER 11th - JCI Active Citizen Day (Previously JCI DAY)

JCI Secretary General Edson A. Kodama announces the new JCI Active Citizen Day to celebrate JCI members’ efforts to create positive change internationally for more than 65 years.
 

Warm Greetings to all JCI members worldwide!

For more than half a century, members of our organization have spent every December 11 celebrating JCI Day – the anniversary of the day our organization was founded on the international level in 1944.

At the 2010 JCI World Congress in Osaka, the General Assembly approved the change to JCI Active Citizen Day. When Henry Giessenbier founded the first Junior Chamber Organization in 1915, he said his aim was to bring young people together for “everything which would make … a good citizen a better citizen.” He saw that young people needed a constructive approach to civic problems to make a difference – the very essence of Active Citizenship.

With this new name, we will continue to celebrate JCI’s rich history in international cooperation, but also focus on how we can continue creating positive change in the future.

A Look Back
On December 11th, 1944 30 young active citizens from eight countries-Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama and the United States¬-met in Mexico City to sign a declaration that led to the establishment of Junior Chamber International. In the wake of the Second World War, the federation began on the premise that young people working for mutual understanding could prevent future atrocities like those seen during the war and build a better world. JCI Members soon established JCI Day as a way to commemorate that historic meeting and renew our commitment to creating positive change.

Throughout the years, JCI members have taken the opportunity of JCI Day to organize projects in their communities. Now, 66 years later, JCI members continue to serve their communities to build a better world, creating global impact.

Time to Take Action
The change to JCI Active Citizen Day this year reflects our commitment to creating positive change, and reminds others of our founder’s intentions. It helps others identify with the actions and goals of our organization and our members. I encourage you to take the opportunity of this change to renew your commitment to making a difference today. JCI members are defined by their actions, and we must show the world that we are defined as young active citizens working to make the world a better place.

For the past 22 years, I have been part of this wonderful organization and have witnessed the passion of JCI members creating positive change in their communities and around the world. JCI Active Citizen Day is not just a time to celebrate these young leaders, but to pioneer new efforts to bring about the change we desire. This year, I encourage you to take JCI Active Citizen Day to the next level. Do something in your community that other members can look back on in the future and celebrate your positive impact.

How will YOU celebrate?
What will you do for JCI Active Citizen Day this year? How will you celebrate and unite with other JCI members in your community and around the world? How will you carry on the legacy of 66 years of positive global change?
Show your JCI pride by inviting a friend to a local project. Find a new way to raise awareness for JCI Nothing But Nets. Share the JCI Mission and Vision with other young people in your community and help stir the passion that led you to join JCI. Create an event to celebrate and congratulate your members and supporters. Proudly reflect on JCI members from years past who were an integral part of creating positive change.

JCI Active Citizen Day is a day to commemorate the past, present and future of JCI. This day, we will stand up and take new steps toward building a better world.

Best regards and best wishes for a joyous JCI Active Citizen Day,

Edson A. Kodama
JCI Secretary General 

Source : http://www.jci.cc/news/home.php?news=17496

NEWS : DECEMBER 10th - International Human Rights Day

 

Human Rights Day 2010 on 10 December recognizes the work of human rights defenders worldwide who act to end discrimination.

 

Acting alone or in groups within their communities, every day human rights defenders work to end discrimination by campaigning for equitable and effective laws, reporting and investigating human rights violations and supporting victims.

While some human rights defenders are internationally renowned, many remain anonymous and undertake their work often at great personal risk to themselves and their families.

10 December 2010 -- On this day in 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which has become a universal standard for defending and promoting human rights. Every year on 10 December, Human Rights Day marks the adoption of the Universal Declaration. It is celebrated around the globe that "All human beings are born with equal and inalienable rights and fundamental freedoms". 
 

This year's commemoration highlights and promotes the achievements of human rights defenders who fight to end discrimination. Human rights defenders protest abuses of human rights, advocate for justice and seek to protect the victims of human rights violations. They demand accountability for perpetrators and transparency in government action. In so doing, they are often putting at risk their own safety, and that of their families.

Some human rights defenders are famous, but most are not. They are active in every part of the world, working alone and in groups, in local communities, in national politics and internationally.

Human Rights Day 2010 emphasises the primary responsibility governments have in enabling and protecting human rights defenders. The Day's theme “Speak up, Stop Discrimination” is also intended to inspire a new generation of defenders to speak up and take action to end discrimination in all of its forms whenever and wherever it is manifested.

Source: Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)

NEWS : DECEMBER 9th - International Anti-Corruption Day

International Anti-Corruption Day is being observed today the 9th December 2010.

International Anti-Corruption Day is a time for political leaders, governments, legal bodies and lobby groups to work together against corruption work by promoting the day and the issues that surround this event. On this day anti-corruption advocates organize events to engage the general public to effectively fight against corruption and fraud in communities.Some organizations hold special recognition ceremonies to pay tribute to people and projects that provide assistance to nations and communities in the battle against corruption.

The "Your NO Counts" campaign is a joint international campaign created by the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to mark International Anti-Corruption Day (9 December) and raise awareness about corruption and how to fight it.

The 2009 joint international campaign focuses on how corruption hinders efforts to achieve the internationally agreed upon MDGs, undermines democracy and the rule of law, leads to human rights violations, distorts markets, erodes quality of life and allows organized crime, terrorism and other threats to human security to flourish.

NEWS : Zone XVII Team at OTS 2010

NEWS : NATCON 2010 at VIZAG

 

Download : NATCON 2010 Registration Form

NEWS : ZP Elect Jc G Subramaniam Outstanding

Our Zone President (Elect) 2011, Jc G Subramaniam stood as the outstanding Zone President Participant in the recently concluded OFFICERS TRAINING SEMINAR conducted by JCI INDIA at Kerala.

Kudos to him and Best Wishes to him and team of Office Bearers for a successful year 2011.

2010 மண்டல தலைவரின் ஆண்டரிக்கை

 மண்டலம் 17ன், 2010ம் வருட தலைவர் ஜேஸி வேல் சுப்ரமணியத்தின் ஆண்டரிக்கையான ”உள் மனதின் ஓசை”...

Download : ஆண்டரிக்கை 2010