Community Organizers

By definition, a community is a group of people that live in the same place, under the same laws. That would seem to suggest that the smallest community to organize is the family that lives under the same roof.

It takes a certain amount of skill to organize a family. There are work schedules and school schedules to balance, meals to prepare and eat, social activities and obligations to be met, bills to pay, errands to run, a household to manage. Parents are in fact community organizers of a sort.

To be an effective community organizer one must, therefore, keep up with what is going on in one's community. To be a good citizen one must also keep up with what is going on in one's community. To raise good citizens, parents have to help educate their children about their local government.

Community activities are a good place to start. I know there are only so many hours in a day and most of us are busy attending to the needs of our families, but attending local parades can be a form of cheap family entertainment.

People with internet access really have no excuse for not knowing what events are taking place in their communities and when because most communities have websites that announce such things.

It doesn't cost anything to take your children to a city council meeting and let them experience first hand how their local government operates. Of course, I'm not talking about infants or toddlers. Nor are you required to go to every city council meeting. But is one city council meeting per year really out of the question?

Yes, it does take a little effort to keep up with local elections, but knowing when they take place and taking children with you to vote is one way for parents to lead by example. After all, community organizers for Barack Obama focused their attention on getting people to vote and look what they helped accomplish.

Schools can educate students on the basics of how government works, but teachers cannot tell your children what you support or don't support or why. Only you can teach your children that.

Copyright © 2009 Annette Fortunato

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