#ElectrifyAfrica Act Passes the House & Senate!

Did you hear? The Electrify Africa Act passed in the House of Representatives! Because it already passed in the Senate in December, this means the next stop is President Obama's desk. When he signs it, it will help sub-Saharan African countries to increase modern electricity access, which will save lives, boost education, alleviate extreme poverty, and accelerate economic growth. Hooray!

I first wrote about Electrify Africa in July of 2014. Yep, you read that right. A year and a half ago. And that certainly wasn't even at the beginning of the life of the bill, which started out with a self-dating name of "Electrify Africa Act of 2013." The bill took on the thorny problem of the lack of consistent electric power in Africa. In sub-Saharan Africa, 589 million people do not have access to electricity. In 20 African countries, endemic power shortages - at all economic levels - are a way of life. This lack impacts lives in profound ways with disproportionately negative effects on women and girls. For example:

• Poor healthcare: 30% of health facilities do not have electricity to store vaccines, operate medical equipment like incubators, or even provide consistent light during childbirth.
• Toxic fumes: Every year, over 3 million worldwide premature deaths occur from exposure to toxic smoke of indoor open fires and kerosene for cooking, heating, and lighting. That's more deaths than malaria and HIV/AIDS combined.
• Limited or no education: 90 million kids in sub-Saharan Africa attend schools without electricity. In many places, women and girls must spend hours each day in the time-consuming task of gathering fuel, often a key reason why girls spend less time in school than boys.
• Lack of safety: Without streetlights, telephones, or other means of communication, women and girls are particularly vulnerable after dark. 

The Electrify Africa Act seeks to prioritize and coordinate U.S. government resources to encourage the installation of at least an additional 20,000 megawatts of electrical power and promote first-time access to electricity for at least 50 million people, particularly the poor, by 2020. It requires our president to develop a comprehensive, multi-year strategy to addressing these problems. It also encourages USAID to provide additional grants and make loan guarantees to local African banks to facilitate investment in African power projects.

Those initiatives and more will have the effect of preserving life and bringing economic growth to areas of Africa that desperately need it. 

St. Louis ONE volunteers with Senator
McCaskill's district aide

We did this...the volunteers of the ONE Campaign. Citizens. Moms, kids, engineers, teachers, and more. Never fool yourself into believing that Congress would have done this all by themselves. Sure, a handful of them have their eye on extreme poverty issues, but as a whole body of legislators, they do not naturally unite to help the most vulnerable people without power or influence. 

So...everybody take a step back and let out a deep breath. Pour a beverage of your choice and toast yourself. Advocacy works! When it does, we need to celebrate it to fuel our souls for the next flight. But for today..."Cheers!" To me...to you...to all of those who will receive power and be empowered for years to come.

P.S. If you would like to see the C-SPAN clip of the bill passing, check out this link.

Anti-Poverty Mom Snow Day Activities

I'm noticing today that some DC schools are still closed or delayed and I bet that's true for a lot more as well. Believe, me East Coasters...out here in the Midwest we know what you are going through. The first day is all about digging out and having some giddy snowball fights and sledding runs. The next days bring the celebration of children as the snow days continue and you think "Well, I have enough milk to make some more cocoa." Then, you're eventually tearing your hair out because it's no longer novel, the kids are starting to bicker, and you'd really rather be getting back to work as well.

So, here are my three favorite snow day activities that keep kids busy as the snow plows finish their excavation. You can use this time to help make the world a better place to live in when everyone is all dug out again!

#1 Write letters or pictures for Congress

A picture of a very sick girl with a crying mother
followed by a recovery picture where she is even
given a crown. What can I say?...it was the
princess phase. 

Always a favorite of mine. For younger kids, it's more of an arts and crafts project where you tell them about a subject and ask them to draw a picture of it while you write the real letter to Congress. For older kids, it can involve a bit of learning as well. It works best if you can show a video to either age group to make it real.

Here are a few great videos to show them about global health for kids. Ask your kids to draw a picture or write a letter about what they saw. Then, send it in to your US Representative asking them to "Please co-sign the Reach Every Mother and Child Act (HR 3706) to help save the lives of moms and kids using best practices like nutrition, immunizations, and care for moms before and after childbirth."

Living Proof: Rotavirus Vaccine Success in Nicaragua  

The People who Made India Polio Free

Don't know your representative? Look it up here. 

#2 Clean closets and look for donations 

This is such a good activity because it gets kids involved in giving in a way that is very personal. Plus, you will gain a lot of closet and dresser space! You need to do this anyway every year as your kids grow, so put them to work now. Gently used toys, clothes, shoes are always needed in any community. In the St Louis area, we have many families who were recently forced out of their homes by freak winter floods and need to quickly replace everything. A quick internet search or a call to a local house of worship can usually direct you to a place to donate. 

Still can't find a local place? Schoola is doing a fundraiser collecting used clothes and giving 40% of the proceeds from selling it to the Malala Fund to secure girls' rights to a minimum of 12 years of quality education, particularly in the Global South. Fill out the form on this link and they will send you a bag, postage-paid, to send back full of your old clothes.

On our last big snow day, we excavated 2 big garbage bags worth of treasures. I was rewarded with an incredulous daughter standing in her closet saying, "It's soooo big now!"


#3 Social Media Blizzard!

Get creative for your favorite organizations and tweet out pictures with their handles and hashtags. Print out signs or get messy and make pictures of an organization's logo with glitter and glue. You can even tweet messages to your members of Congress. The senators may not be in their offices now, but the internet is always open for business! Don't want your kids in the picture? No problem. You can just take a picture of the sign or put yourself in the picture.

There you go! And after you're done saving the world? Go on out and have a little more fun! Wheeeeee!

Make a New Year's Resolution Worth Keeping

A friend on Facebook recently posted: "What's your favorite New Year's resolution that you actually kept...and...GO!!..." Of course, the answers she got back ranged from the serious to the silly: 

• Drink more wine
• Setting up plans with people I said I'd make plans with the prior year
• Try to drive the speed limit (It seems this friend felt she drove too slowly)
• To get rid of toxic things in life
• To love more and judge less
• Never to make resolutions
• To fight poverty

I guess it comes as no surprise to anyone that the last one was my answer. That same poverty-fighting goal has been a Lenten promise, a New Year's resolution, and any number of self-improvement plans for me over the years. Sometimes my methods differ from year to year, but it's rooted in the same desire to put me on the track to end poverty and suffering in the world. The trick is always to keep the motivation up to make real change for such a big problem. I've written about that before...how it's hard to keep fighting the battles we need to fight continuously.

Here's my observation about resolutions and promises to oneself. They can be cyclical. They can be repetitive. It might take a while for them to stick or you might make the same promise in a different way. But the resolutions and promises should be absolutely worth doing. To me, what is more worthwhile than making systematic change to the world we live in to save lives? I plan to keep chipping away at the senseless deaths of children and mothers in poverty. I'll keep working to get more kids in school worldwide. I'll lift my voice to feed the hungry in my country and in others.

Whatever your goal is this year...make it a good one. Make a plan, find support, stay focused, seek inspiration, take action. Don't give up. And if you do? Make the promise again. 

So, I doubt that you are wondering, but in case you want to know my resolution for this year? To fight poverty...harder.

What is your resolution this year and - most importantly - how do you plan to keep it?