Profile of a Volunteer

The job of my pastor is a volunteer job... no one pushed him or coercied him he said I WILL!!
Some of his duties include:
Being  responsible for providing the senior leadership and oversight of the church.
With God’s help, he will serve as the chief visionary to lead the church forward in fulfilling God’s purpose. He is expected to contribute to the team spirit of the staff through fellowship, encouragement, cooperation, prayer support and other appropriate ways, as he serves his Lord Jesus Christ
Provide for the overall health and welfare of the church. To be the primary preacher of the Word of God. This shall be done with love, faithfulness, impartiality and fearfulness knowing that he will be held accountable for the welfare of the flock (Heb. 13:17).See that Bible teaching is a primary function of the church.To conduct weddings and funerals, to see that related counseling is done.
To administer communion, perform baptisms and baby dedications.To work to facilitate peace among members of the staff and congregation; to seek to win back the estranged and to reconcile those with broken relationships, particularly when such conflict threatens the welfare of the church; at times, to work with the church leadership council to determine solutions to some problems of this nature.

To work with the administrator to develop new ministries and help with the overseeing of the current ministries.To oversee and lead other pastoral staff in their related ministries, keeping a uniform

“temperature” of the church.

To serve as an Elder on the Church leadership council.

His work has positively impacted others because over the 17 years that I have been there I have seen many saved, healed, delivered and set free from his pastorialship. 

A "take-away" message that is relative to his work in terms of my own volunteer efforts and advocacy is that "People are able to do what they really want to do." Our Pastor in an effort to help his lay people become more committed to the Lord and to the church always makes this statement and I believe that it also rings true in volunteering and working with families and children.

To lead the church in being a praying church. To call for corporate prayer times and

prayer and fasting times, to see that prayer is made for all people and places.

Using Social Media to Get Connected

My experiance with social media has been that I have had a facebook and myspace account. I have watched youtube but have not personally posted anything on youtube. I have only had a blog through this degree program.
I believe that facebook is a social media tool that lends itself to effective advocacy. You reach so many people all over the world. I have a friend right now who works for healthy families who is advocating that home visiting not be cut and she has used facebook.
I would use facebook to also educate and inspire others in my advocacy work because again it reaches so many people all over the world.
Help I would need from my colleagues on how to use social media would be how to get the word out on You tube. It seems like even our President was able to campaign with you tube so that is the next social media outlet that I need to learn how to use.

Advocacy Messages

Education is key to peace

The foundation of every state is the education of its youth

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance

I think these messages are these messages are so effective in creating action because it basically points out what you need in order to be successful and that is to have an education. Whenever people read things like this it causes them to act. Either it causes them to think about change, or it causes them to want to get up to cause change. The same way ads on television cause us to buy things or to go shopping these ads do the same thing.

My Own Capacity



At work with the kids!!

The issues that fuel my passion that impact young children and families, and the early childhood field are that we have high quality programs in place that all children have access to, and that we have providers and teachers that have quality educations and are getting better compensation. It really urks me to see a program for children and they are not learning or the person in the classroom is not educated enough to do the things needed to teach the child. I really have an issue with compensation. If I put forth effort to educate myself so that I can better educate the children then I should see a higher compensation.
The skills that I have that will contribute to advocacy efforts are I am persistent, I have a passion for the field, I am capable of researching the issues. I am a minister in my church so I have spoken to big audiences standing up for Jesus Christ, compelling people to change their hearts and minds.
The resources that are at my disposal that could benefit my advocacy work are my links to the superintendent of our Board of education, the connection I have with community partners affiliated with the school I work for. I also have connections with ministerial partners in the community.
I think the fact that I love children, I am becoming current on the issues at hand, and that  I am driven to see change will help contribute to my advocacy work.
I hope to be able to reach out to elected officials and have my voice heard. I hope I can grow in this area of advocacy. I believe I can do it.

My Role as An Advocate

What motivated me to start advocating for very young children was my love to watch them grow and learn, also the fact that all children have not been dealt equal shares of education.  It is essential to acknowledge and foster advocacy efforts at the micro level because you have to begin somewhere. 

At the micro level much help is needed the same as at the macro level. In my research I have found that advocacy is building support for an issue among audiences such as the general public, elected officials, the media, and key opinion leaders. Activities such as educating audiences about a topic, sharing illustrative stories, or working on a solution to a problem are considered advocacy. Individual citizens can always contact their elected officials as constituents. I believe this is what helps you to be community leader.

The resources that it takes to be a state leader on early childhood issues is to be informed of early childhood issues, be present and current and get among other state leaders. You’ve got to be able to communicate with legislators and staff through letters, e-mails, phone calls, or personal visits, testify before relevant legislative committees, work with legislature to compel agency administrators to adopt your proposal; this is just to name a few ideas.

 To mobilize others, engage them on the topic, state the problem, inform others about potential solutions and then call to action what you want done about the issue. Someone who was interested in taking a leadership role, I would suggest they meet with their elected officials, build media relationships, do your homework on the issues, and have your own testimonials.

Personal Advocacy Reflection

I have been impacted by the advocacy of my own mother. I can remember when I was in middle school and having a very difficult time in school. The teachers wanted to put me in special education. This was when special education was not inclusive, you were pulled out from your peers, and made to feel different from the rest. My mother stood up for me and said she may be struggling and having a hard time but we will fight this thing without the label of special education. She made me go to summer school, I recieved extra tutoring during the year and it was hard but I made it. I am thankful that she stood up for me. I may very well have needed special ed services at the time but I believe that my mother felt so many children before my time struggled as well and did not have special ed, nor meds and she felt that with a little more help at home and from other sources I would make it and I did.

This impact relates to my own exploration in advocacy because I see how hard she advocated for me which makes me want to advocte for others. I love children and I want to see the best for them. Through advocacy you can work on providing the best for all children.

Tools for Policy Makers and Advocates Week 1

I am glad to be able to continue this journey with a lot of the classmates I started with. We have come a long way and only have one more class to go. I am so excited and proud of what we all have accomplished with the busy lives that we have.
In this class I look forward to learning about policy makers and how advocates can make change on behalf of the children we serve. I hope to learn how to be an advocate among many policy makers. I pray that I make a difference.