“We are the future and we can make change through social media.”
-Daniel Ortega, NCLR, Head of Board.

NCLR has been taking great strides in becoming more engaging and active with new media ever since they hired a great new media manager. Hence, the Sunday townhall event on how youth could engage with new media to bring about social change was both illuminating and engaging.

With Kety Esquivel moderating, Ariel Cerrud from the Boys and Girls Club, Jill Garvey from Imagine 2050, Veronica Arreloa and Amaury Nora from Xicanopwr.com were eloquent panelists who knew their material. I do wish they had arranged for more youth to directly engage with youth in these discussions or even have a round-table with a select number of students who really want to make a difference, but maybe that is wistful thinking. It takes time to crumble walls and build bridges.

New media has indeed taken a small group of undocumented students to new heights and fueled a movement that was stagnant. Halting the deportations of Walter Lara and Taha, building a national coalition spanning 25 states, and making sure that undocumented and immigrant youth voices are heard loud and clear is some of the work we have done in the past 6 months. But list-building doesn’t replace community engagement and organizing.

At NCLR, people actually came up to me saying they knew about the site, that we were doing wonderful work and thanked us. We received a fantastic shoutout from Kety Esquivel, the New Media Manager at NCLR, during a packed lideres townhall.

Lets keep driving this revolution and finding ways to engage community and grassroots organizing with new media work.

Thank you for your support and endorsement @NCLR!

Follow hashtag #NCLR09 on Twitter for up to date news on the conference.