From our news partners at The Seattle Times: We Day, an event to celebrate and encourage local and global action by young people, is expected to draw 15,000 to KeyArena on Wednesday. By Jack Broom.
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Erika Schultz/The Seattle Times Federal Way Public Academy students created bracelets made from Starburst wrappers for a charity fashion show. |
By themselves, jangly bracelets made from soda-can pull tabs by Emily Barrick, 15, and other Federal Way Public Academy students for a charity fashion show aren't going to save the world.
Nor will the funky brown scarves made from shredded T-shirts by other Federal Way students, including Aimee Coronado, 12.
Same with the stack of book bags taken to a girls school in India by Bijou Basu, 16, a student at The Overlake School in Redmond.
But taken together — and combined with thousands of other acts by thousands of other students — these individual good deeds begin to have real power.
That's the thinking behind We Day, expected to draw some 15,000 middle- and high-school students and supporters from 400 schools across the state to KeyArena Wednesday.
"When young people choose to become active for a cause … When they are passionate about serving others, they are not alone," said Craig Kielburger, co-founder of Free the Children, the Toronto-based charity organizing the event.
Students couldn't buy tickets to the event, part concert and part pep rally. They earned their way in, by committing to work on at least one local and one global service project.
Performers and celebrities on tap include Jennifer Hudson, Magic Johnson, Martin Sheen, Mia Farrow, Nelly Furtado and Martin Luther King III, son of the slain civil-rights leader.
Students will also hear from Spencer West, who despite having had both legs amputated, climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, on his hands. And from 9-year-old Robby Novak, better known as "Kid President" in popular YouTube videos (including a recent one in which he picked Gonzaga to win the NCAA basketball tournament.)
