Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on September 10, 2020
Below are the highlights and featured resources of this past week’s Daily* Resource.
9/9/2020 - We Need YOU to Work the Polls
Older, experienced citizens are staples of election voting sites. In 2018, 58% of poll workers were age 61 or older. Unfortunately, these critical cogs of our democracy are also the most susceptible to COVID-19. Because of this, many are opting against working the polls this cycle. While that’s the right decision for the health of individuals, it means that we’re facing a critical poll worker shortage right before an election that may result in record breaking turnout.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on September 03, 2020
Below are the highlights and featured resources of last week’s Daily* Resources.
9/1/2020 - I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies
The subject line of this email is a snippet of the oath that every civil servant must take before working for the U.S. government. It was also a friend’s reply to a Facebook post by Bridge Alliance Co-Founder, Debilyn Molineaux asking people what principles they are willing to defend. Debilyn explains that this commitment to fight for our republic is shared across partisan and ideological divides and provides fertile opportunity for common ground.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on August 27, 2020
Below are the highlights and featured resources of last week’s Daily* Resources, as well as the Friday before.
8/27/2020 - “The Woman’s Hour” -- Celebrating Women’s Right to Vote
It has been 100 years and 1 day since the 19th Amendment -- the right to vote for women -- was certified for inclusion in the U.S. Constitution. That amendment states that, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” This was the largest extension of voting rights in American history, as it extended voting rights to 27,000,000 women.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on August 20, 2020
When COVID-19 upended the world in late March and sent America into lockdown, we asked ourselves how we could best serve our members and supporters during these tumultuous times. We decided that the best course of action was to focus on informing our supporters of the various coronavirus-related resources being produced by Bridge Alliance members.
To do this, we turned “The Weekly Update” into “The Daily Resource” so that Bridge Alliance supporters would have access to new resources and information on a timely basis. We also created the COVID-19 Resource Packet (now the Crisis Recovery Guide) so that supporters could find the resources they needed to learn about the novel coronavirus, take advantage of the CARES Act, adjust their family/work/school life, continue to strengthen democracy, etc.
Additionally, we ramped up our efforts to encourage diversity in the healthy self-governance movement. Those efforts included a labor and time-intensive report on diversity in the movement, which examined diversity among Bridge Alliance member leaders and identified areas for growth.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on March 19, 2020
Featured Blog Post: Three Things Families Can Do Together
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We have entered a new time in the United States and around the world. COVID-19 has completely upended normal routines of everyday life. Government officials at the national, state, and local levels are scrambling to provide leadership and contain a disease that is highly contagious, has no known cures, and is deadly to the most vulnerable among us. All while maintaining calm for the public.
The Bridge Alliance is an “alliance,” but in many ways we’re also a family, and we will do our small part to help you through these times. We have a community of 100+ organizations, and our community is composed of compassionate leaders who want to help you in every way that they can. We have members who address the human response like Living Room Conversations, which has already put together a resource page to help alleviate some of the anxiety and stress that many of us are experiencing right now.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on March 13, 2020
Featured Blog Post: Beyond Left vs Right: 14 Types of Ideological Bias
Find a Job in the Movement at DemocracyJobs.org. One of the great innovations of the 21st century is harnessing the power of the internet to connect people instantly no matter their location. With one click, I can have a face-to-face conversation with colleagues from coast-to-coast. Living Room Conversations is taking full advantage of this technology with its slate of digital conversations. If you’ve never participated in one of these conversations, I strongly encourage you to give them a try. Here are a couple upcoming conversations (You can find all their offerings at www.livingroomconversations.org/events/):
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on March 06, 2020
Featured Blog Post: The “Most Abused” Freedom of Information Act Exemption Still Needs to Be Reined In
Find a Job in the Movement at DemocracyJobs.org
It seems like every campaign season candidates brag about raising millions from their “small donor” base, which serves as “proof” that they are not controlled by big money donors. It’s even better to say that you’ve raised more money from small donors than large donors. It’s even better to say that you’ve raised more money from small donors than large donors. Unfortunately, it takes a high profile campaign to pull that off, and the vast majority of candidates are not running high profile campaigns. That’s why, according to the National Institute for Money in Politics (NIMP), the average candidate for state office receives over ¾ of their campaign contributions from some combination of large donors ($1,000+), non-party organizations, and their political party.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on February 27, 2020
Featured Blog Post: Creating Better Conversations through Meta-Consensus
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It’s easy to feel alone during the dreary winter months, as our voices seem drowned out by the chaos of the election cycle. We all seem to be “Bowling Alone.” Common Ground Solutions is exploring this loneliness at its core, and the efforts to reverse the destructive trend -- including those led by Bridge Alliance member Citizen University.
If you (or someone you know) are lonely and disengaged, check out the multitude of Bridge Alliance member organizations that want to connect with you! Events are happening all the time, both virtually and in-person. If you happen to be in the D.C. / Maryland area on February 28th, Better Angels is hosting a workshop in Carroll County, Maryland on how to communicate effectively across the political divide, and Stand Up Republic is hosting its Summit on Principled Conservatism. And if you happen to be in northern Florida in early March, Village Square is planning its Annual Tallahassee Town Hall on March 10th.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on February 20, 2020
Featured Blog Post: Coordination Watch: How candidates and outside groups work together to evade anti-corruption laws
Subscribe to How Do We Fix It! And check out Episode 241: Boosting Voter Turnout: Seth Flaxman
It is difficult for young people to become active participants in our democratic republic. Before you’re 18, you aren’t allowed to vote or run for public office. So when young people go to college, becoming politically engaged isn’t automatic. It can take a backseat to coping with living on their own for the first time, along with handling a more challenging course load and entirely new social dynamics, including people whose political views are shaped by entirely different life experiences.
This is one of the reasons why youth empowerment organizations are so critical to the healthy self-governance movement. It is vital to help young Americans build civic habits early on, which is why the Bridge Alliance is thrilled to welcome the higher education focused Campus Election Engagement Project (CEEP) and high school focused Civics Unplugged to the Alliance.
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Posted by Bridge Alliance Education Fund on February 13, 2020
Featured Blog Post: Partisan Takes Won't Define Nonpartisan Action Civics
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A large part of the Bridge Alliance’s work revolves around conversations. “Bridging Ideological Divides” is the biggest category of membership (31 organizations), and “Facilitating Citizen / Government Interaction” isn’t too far behind (19 organizations). With so many member organizations interested in encouraging dialogue to bridge the divide and find common ground, there are numerous opportunities for collaboration.
The Center for the Study of Liberty (CSL) is taking full advantage by partnering with two of the biggest names in citizen discussions -- Better Angels and Living Room Conversations (LRC). On February 19th, CSL will host John Wood, Jr. of Better Angels for a conversation about “the ‘unmooring’ that took place in 2016, the influence of college campuses on our national dialogue, the importance of rebuilding our ‘emotional economy,’ and much more.”
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