One World Youth Project

Setting Goals, Building Solutions

Have you ever set a goal for yourself? What made you think of the goal? Did you want to improve a skill or work toward something? How did you measure whether or not you met this goal?

People make personal goals all the time.  But, what about goals for a community? Who decides how a community should progress and improve? Who decides how to set goals to reach the desired result for the community?

For this exercise, imagine YOU are the person setting the goals for your community to be reached by the year 2015…

How would you describe your community?

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What do you like most about your community? Least?

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What are your concerns for the local community? What problems do you see? List five to eight concerns.

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What goals could you set to lessen the impact of these problems or eliminate your concerns?  Use this space to sketch out ideas…do not worry about complete sentences … use this space as a draft.

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Now, take your notes and ideas and formulate them into eight goals for your local community to be reached by 2015.

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Share your goals with your peers.  Are your ideas similar? Different?

This is very much what the United Nations has done.  They have set eight goals to be reached by the year 2015 in order to make our global community a better place.  After years of discussion, the United Nations decided on the following eight Millennium Development Goals:

1) Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

2) Achieve universal primary education

3) Promote gender equality and empower women

4) Reduce child mortality

5) Improve maternal health

6) Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

7) Ensure environmental sustainability

8) Develop a global partnership for development

Nations and people across the globe are working together to reach these goals.  Great progress has been made; however there is still more work to be done.  According to the United Nations Development Program Administer, Mark Malloch Brown, 2005 is considered the “make or break” year of the Millennium Development Goals. 

Only together can we achieve these goals.  It is not only the job of politicians to work toward these goals; it is also the job of individuals like you! With One World Youth Project you have an opportunity to help “make” these goals a reality by designing a United Nations Community Service Project!

One World Youth Project Curriculum      www.oneworldyouthproject.org