Tomorrow, Portland State and City Club of Portland will host the Portland Action Summit: Leadership for the Next Generation in the Smith Memorial Student Union Ballroom from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. The event includes free food and features guest speakers such as Portland Mayor Sam Adams, Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith, Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown, Portland Public Schools Superintendent Carole Smith and area youth leaders.
The purpose of this event is “to provide opportunities for a diverse group of students, educators and community leaders to explore strategies for enhancing youth engagement and community involvement. Students can share opinions, make suggestions to community leaders and gain skills,” CCP Executive Director Charity Fain said.
Attendees will have the opportunity to participate in training sessions on lobbying, creating sustainable change and direct action organizing.
“We are aiming for participants to be inspired to take action and want the training sessions to give them some skills to do just that. We’ll also have many partner organizations there who offer volunteer opportunities and ongoing training programs,” Fain said. “This is a great way to get an introduction and make connections.”
Students involved in the summit’s planning include anthropology senior Patrick Belin, who was asked by the University Honors Program to help coordinate the event. Belin contacted members of the Bus Project, an organization whose goal is to introduce new people into Oregon’s democracy, to help organize this event.
David Douglas High School student Zahara Muhammed is one of the event’s guest speakers. “I managed to get her on board to be one of our featured speakers for the Friday forum presentation. She’s an inspiring young lady, and we feel that she should share her story with others on a larger stage at the summit,” Belin said.
Belin hopes high school and college students will not only make valuable connections from this summit but also be more active in the community, taking action on certain issues instead of just talking about them.
“A big part of the reason why students aren’t getting their needs met is because they’re not doing enough to engage with their communities in the first place. Too many students are happy to sit and complain about how everything is wrong and about how the system is corrupt yet do little to create or become a part of the change they would like to see happen,” Belin said. “This is what I see the summit hoping to achieve: it’s hoping to bring together groups of people that don’t engage each other on issues in the community that are relevant to everyone who lives here,” he added.
Film production junior Ben Ferguson also helped coordinate the event and has strong hopes for what the summit can accomplish. “I think that students should care about the summit because it’s an opportunity for them to learn how to become leaders by working with some of the greatest leaders in our community. I also believe that it’s the perfect event for any student who has ever felt frustrated because they feel they have no control over how our community develops. The summit will offer them the tools to influence their environment in a positive way,” Ferguson said.
Fain and the rest of the summit organizers are excited for the event because they have wanted to partner with PSU for quite some time and because they will get to promote youth involvement within the community and CCP.
“In addition, we’ve just released a comprehensive research report looking at civics education that will be discussed at the summit. We are also really excited to see most of our sessions being facilitated by youth leaders, for example the Lincoln High School We the People team to the city’s youth planners and the Friday Forum Speakers. We’ll also have training sessions led by the Bus Project and the Oregon Student Association,” Fain said.
CCP has another group called the New Leaders Council that helps facilitate events and offers similar civics training to audiences under the age of 30. The club also offers PSU students a student membership rate if they are interested in joining. Fain hopes to partner with PSU for another event in the future.
“We are always exploring ways to partner with PSU but do not currently have a major event like this planned—though we hope to continue to work with the honors program to find ways for students to receive academic credit for volunteering at City Club,” Fain said.