Youth Driving the Change

Editor's Note: Andrew Leon Hanna and Blair Brettschneider represented the United States at the 7th Annual UNESCO

Over 211 youth of different backgrounds, colors, ethnicities, and beliefs all unified together in one room.  This was the beautiful scene of the 7th UNESCO Youth Forum held in Paris two weeks ago. At the Forum, we discussed challenges facing youth and drafted recommendations to present to the UNESCO General Conference. Along the way, we discovered a few things about both ourselves, and the nation we represent.

1.  There is a real sense of responsibility that comes with being Americans. We felt a certain inspiration sitting behind the U.S. plaque. It made us want to present an image of America that reflects all the amazing, diverse youth doing great things back at home.  When other delegates were working diligently to stand up for the rights of ethnic and religious minorities, people with disabilities, and LGBT communities, we felt a sense of pride in saying “the United States supports you,” instead of just “Blair and Andrew support you.”

2.  So much can be learned from taking the time to look at things from other’s perspectives. On our first day, we had lunch with Timothy, a delegate from Zambia, who expressed his frustration with perceptions of Africa. He discussed his distaste for the way many people portray Africa as a desperate continent full of problems, and lacking competent people capable of solving those problems. According to Timothy, Africa shouldn’t be considered a charity case. As the American delegates, we had been worried about possible negative stereotypes that could be cast upon us, but through our talk w/ Timothy, we realized that we weren’t the only ones.

3.  There will always be incredibly significant obstacles to positive change. Even with such an awesome group of driven young people, the tendency still existed for delegates to look narrowly at their own community’s problems without considering the larger picture. It’s human nature to want to look out for “our people” first, and this problem plagues all forms of representative government. With more inter-cultural, international dialogue, however, we can make this challenge much less daunting. It is only with these discussions that we can begin to expand our view of “our people” to include more than just those in our communities or our countries.

4.  It would truly be amazing to see how the world would work if youth were to suddenly take the reigns of power. If we had our way, everyone would have access to free education, all types of unjust discrimination would cease to exist, girls would stay in school, refugees and immigrants would have a voice (and the world would listen) and everyone would be educated in and focused on sustainable development and solutions for the environment. The best part is that we as youth don’t tend to look at these things like ideals that can never be reached.  The delegates are actively taking steps towards these goals in their own countries and communities, and they aren’t letting anyone tell them that their goals are out of reach.

5.  Peace is within reach. We’re young and, yes, idealistic, but we’re not naïve.  It’s hard to go to a conference and call for peace on behalf of a country that is involved in…how many wars, now? As difficult as that was, it provided us with an opportunity. One fantastic moment of the Forum was meeting Zahraa, a delegate from Iraq. Blair had worked with Iraqi refugee girls, and wanted to meet her. Zahraa was so kind, and even gave us a published report about Iraqi youth, full of useful information about the girls in Blair’s program. Throughout the rest of the day, we always smiled and said hello in passing, even though we couldn’t speak the same language. That certainly doesn’t end or erase years of war, but at least we both know we’re on each other’s side.

In fact, if there’s one message that we want to share after this week, it is this: there always exists an underlying peace, unity, and happiness just waiting to be realized. There is hope as long as we are willing to spend enough time with one another to realize that beyond any difference, we are all human beings seeking the same things: love, support, and happiness.

We arrived in Paris with open minds and a willingness to get to know each other. We left with dear friends from around the world who we are now willing to fight for. We discussed, we argued, we laughed, we celebrated.

Call us overly optimistic if you want, but we have great hope for this generation and the future of our world. And we’ve got 211 young leaders and friends from all corners of the globe who will back us up.