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BETHANY STUDENT FORMS NEW SOCIAL JUSTICE GROUP
Bethany College junior Kimberly Streit has used training gained at a summer conference sponsored by Oxfam America to launch a new student organization at the college.
The new group, Social Justice Advocates, has approximately 15 members and intends to support use of fair-trade coffee on campus and to educate the student body about other social justice issues. Paperwork on the group’s official college approval is in the works.
Streit, a native of Tipton, Kansas, participated in Oxfam America’s week-long “Change Initiative” workshop this past summer in Boston. There she took classes in leadership skills and issues training.
Oxfam America is a non-profit organization “that works to end global poverty through saving lives, strengthening communities and campaigning for change,” according to its material. It is associated with Oxfam International.
Social Justice Advocates will sponsor an awareness event in October where they will give away fair-trade coffee. They also will participate in the Bethany College alternative gift market, which will be held before the holidays.
Oxfam America and the student organization advocate for direct purchase of coffee from independent coffee growers, thusly eliminating the middleman. This allows more of the profit to go to the growers and results in a higher quality coffee, because growers can be trained in what makes for a tastier coffee, said Streit.
Streit became interested in Oxfam while hearing the group’s regional representative, Jim French, speak at Bethany College in the spring of 2006. She and French have given presentations on campus this fall.
Streit says that the most inspiring part of the summer conference was “hearing some of the people who have made this their life’s work—to see that change actually does happen,” she said.
Bethany College, established by Swedish Lutheran immigrants in 1881, is a college of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The mission of Bethany College is to nurture and challenge individuals in their search for truth and meaning as they live lives of faith, learning and service.
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