ONE Campaign involves JMU campus in hunger fight

Initiative aims to bring attention to worldwide poverty, AIDS

By Caroline Cournoyer, staff writer  
Posted on October 15, 2007

The ONE Campaign, created to eliminate poverty, sparked the ONE Campus Challenge this fall to remind students across the nation of the power of their voices.

Currently, JMU is ranked 55 of the more than 1,300 participating schools.

“This is an opportunity for college students to have a part in what can be the biggest contribution our generation makes,” ONE Press Secretary Kimberly Cadena said.

Maisie Pigeon is one of 11 student outreach interns for ONE in the nation. She guides all colleges from Washington, D.C. to Charleston, S.C. that want to create a ONE team.

“The goal of ONE is to stop extreme poverty so people are not losing their lives,” Pigeon said. “I think that is absolutely possible in our lifetime to accomplish,” Pigeon said.

The close, unsanitary accommodations that those in poverty endure cause the spread of deadly diseases like AIDS and malaria, according to Pigeon.

“All the problems are intertwined and closely linked but I think poverty is the focal point from which they all stem,” she said.

Currently, only a small portion of the federal budget is spent on the fight against AIDS and poverty. Among donor nations, the United States contributes one of the lowest amounts, according to the ONE Campaign.

“If Congressmen were pressured to expand that number to even two percent, it would make so much of a difference,” Pigeon said. “If more people were aware of it, more pressure would be put on our own government, and things would begin to happen.”

However, surveys have revealed that Americans are under the impression that more than 15 percent of the federal budget goes towards foreign aid, according to ONE.

“I’m not totally shocked because of America’s obsession with the fact that we are the superior country and only allocate money where it seems to benefit us more than other countries,” junior political science major Lindsay Noth said.

In order to combat this discrepancy, the ONE Campus Challenge consists of three stages to bring attention to poverty and AIDS worldwide.

In the first stage, schools are asked to complete challenges for points, like taking a picture of your school mascot with a ONE shirt on, recruiting members to your university’s team and creating a ONE chapter at your college.

In January, stage two will commence as representatives from the top 100 schools will have the opportunity to participate in a three-day conference in D.C.. During stage three, the top ten schools will receive $1,000 grants to fund their own poverty-fighting programs.

The ONE Campus Challenge is working to bring attention to the issues of poverty and AIDS during the 2008 presidential election.

I don’t think every individual is aware of the power and influence they have [in the United States] because everyone has the same power and influence,” Pigeon said. “But if someone goes abroad they will realize, we are the voice of the future. It’s quite true that if candidates were to bank on the 18-24 [year old] block, it would absolutely make a difference in the elections.”

Cadena said that college students must voice their concern and support for others in need.

“College students have been involved with every great movement in American history,” Cadena said. “Students absolutely will be and can be the force in the movement to make poverty history.”