What Gets You Off Your Butt?
Wild horses? An invitation from the Queen? Or seeing people in need? What motivates you?

Select one choice for each question and then click submit!

When you saw pictures of U2's Bono on his trip to Africa, which he took to bring global attention to the poverty and HIV/AIDS crisis there, you thought "I just want to go there to pitch in and help those children and families." "I'm going to send money to help those people." "I'm going to write a letter to tell Congress to give money for debt relief to struggling countries." You read on your town's website that there are now more elderly people in America (and in your town) than ever. You want to do something nice for them, so you call one of the senior centers to see if you can come down and hang out a day or two a week. come up with a fundraiser to create a community garden where seniors can plant flowers and hang out during the day. start a petition to have a neighborhood Appreciation Day for Seniors. Your class is kicking off next school year with a student-run anti-violence campaign, you volunteer to spend a few hours as a counselor's assistant at a youth shelter. to get businesses to donate money and supplies to for the campaign. offer to start a youth advisory panel that would work with the school board on ways to prevent violence. You've noticed that there's not really anything for teens to do in your town when school is out. So you decide to see if you can volunteer to help out at a local day care or hospital or something. organize a teen-only skate-a-thon or a bike-a-thon to raise money for some good cause. start a letter writing campaign to ask your school board to open the school's gym for recreation hours. For National Hunger Awareness Day in June, every club and organization at your school has to get involved. You try to get your group to serve lunch at a local soup kitchen. use the funds from a car wash or walk-a-thon to buy groceries for local families in need. write an article for your school paper and send information out to all local media outlets. Your school is totally wired, but there are some schools near you where kids don't even know how to get on the internet. You spend a couple of hours every week teaching kids how to use the web. organize a computer drive to solicit unwanted and used computer software and equipment. create and circulate a petition to get the state to allocate more money for computers certain schools.

   --By Heather Keets Wright