Congratulations on completing a year of service as a Jumpstart member! You are among a network of thousands who devoted themselves to children, classrooms, and communities this year. You showed up each day determined to spark the joy of learning in your children. And they thrived. You should be tremendously proud of your service and contribution. We honor and thank you!
So now you may be wondering, what’s next? As you know, for every classroom where children are engaged by well-trained and caring adults like you, there are ten others in this country filled with equally deserving children who do not enjoy the same enriching learning environment. That is not fair, and it has to change. And now you can be a part of that change.
You have a unique opportunity to speak up, not only for the children you served, but the six million more beside them who live in poverty in neighborhoods throughout the country. Every young child deserves a foundation of love and knowledge on which to build a happy and successful life. But this won’t happen just because it should. We must let our elected leaders know that all children deserve high-quality early education. We must let our elected leaders know that young children should be taught by well-trained educators who are compensated like the professionals they are. We must let our elected leaders know that higher education must be made more affordable. We must let our elected leaders know that the future of our country depends on it.
As a new Jumpstart alum, you will now have the opportunity to participate in and shape Jumpstart’s policy advocacy activities. Led by a former advisor to a Governor and a former Congressional staff member, Jumpstart’s Policy & Government Relations Department advocates for legislative change on all the issues we care about at Jumpstart. There are a number of ways for you to get involved—some as easy as clicking a button to sign onto a letter going to your member of Congress or as active as helping to organize other Jumpstart alums to advocate too. Children across the country need your engagement at any level you can contribute. And the Policy & Government Relations staff will provide you with everything you need to do it—from background information to talking points to identifying your elected officials.
What exactly you choose to do is entirely up to you. If you want to learn more about how to elevate the voices of the children you’ve served into the halls of power, all you have to do today is this: send us an email at policy@jstart.org and say “Please keep me in the loop on how I can continue to fight for education.” And we’ll be in touch from there.
Thank you again for your service this year and we look forward to hearing from you!
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