Everyone Matters is a campaign geared toward youth with a mission of global inclusiveness. The list of famous people that are part of this campaign is quite long. From Paul McCartney to Archbishop Desmond Tutu along with other organizations and the public.
The goal of the campaign is to bring people together to embrace inclusiveness and tolerance of everyone’s differences. People with disabilities are often judged or felt excluded. Public awareness of everyones differences and looking at how damaging pre-conceived judgments are can be a very effective way to create change.
The Everyone Matters campaign has a blog and different programs that focus on changing peoples views of each other and embracing other’s differences. They also encourage kids to start an Everyone Matters facebook page for their own school. Click here to find out about a page set-up.
Some of the programs they have to encourage people to recognize that each individual does matter are:
The 24-hour challenge. It asks you to sign up to make a commitment of not judging anyone for 24 hours.
“I AM!” Photo– this project asks people from around the world to send a face shot of themselves and make a sign affirming who they are. The sign can be a few words on a sheet of paper, a t-shirt or somewhere creative like on a cake.
Letting Go Of Judgment Tree was a project done by a student at University of Maine at Presque Isle. The concept is to take blank leaves and have people anonymously write a judgmental word or phrase they have been called, called someone else or have even thought. They put the leaves all over a tree to enlighten people with a visual prop that represents how much judgment there is in the world around them. It brings awareness to people to let go of judgment. This is a great project idea for schools or in the workplace.
They also have different film projects such as Film Your Issue (FYI) where they ask kids from the ages of 18 to 26 to choose an issue and film 30-60 seconds about it. They get prizes such as an internship at Walt Disney Studio, Toshiba laptops and vacations. They are also getting ready to announce details about an upcoming short film competition.
Remember EVERYONE DOES MATTER! If you would like to become part of this campaign, get involved. Make a short film, encourage friends to sign up for the 24-hour challenge, post a video that might teach someone about tolerance or upload an “I AM’ photo!