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https://www.kiwanis.org/
Kiwanis has a world of opportunities for educators and students to connect.

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What Does it Mean to be a Global Citizen?

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UPDATED 10/9/18 The growing interconnectedness among people, countries, and economies means that there is a global dimension to who we are. The most positive way of responding to this is by pursuing a path of global citizenship. Global citizens see ourselves as part of an emerging world community, and are committed to helping build this community's values and practices.

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Global Citizenship: Taking It Local!

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Global Citizenship Education: Taking it Local!

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A sometimes tearful Greta Thunberg criticised EU leaders in Strasbourg for not taking the threat posed by climate change seriously enough

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Greta Thunberg's emotional speech to EU leaders

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Approximately 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the United States, and hundreds of thousands of people are in jail simply because they cannot afford to make bail. People involved with the criminal justice system often experience poverty both before and after detention. Coss Marte, founder of fitness studio ConBody, is helping formerly incarcerated people like himself find financial stability and opportunity. Criminal justice and cash bail reform are crucial to tackling the issues of poverty and discrimination in the US. You can take action here.
When Coss Marte walks around New York City's Lower East Side, he can barely take five steps before he's stopped by someone he knows. People come out of the corner bodega to dap him up, hop off bikes to say hi, or give slight nods as they pass by.

Marte was born and raised on the Lower East Side. He's seen it go from a crime-ridden neighborhood of abandoned and decrepit buildings to a site of trendy eateries and pricey cocktail bars. And the neighborhood, in turn, has watched the 33-year-old son of Dominican immigrants undergo his own evolution.
"I thought that was gonna be my whole life."
Marte was raised by a single mother who worked in a factory, and struggled to support their family on her low wages. They lived below the poverty line, he said, and he envied the things people around him seemed to have.

"The guys on the block had chains and money and clothes and everything I wanted that my mom couldn't provide for me," he recalled. "So as a kid, the people I looked up to were drug dealers."

At 13, he started selling drugs and was arrested for the first time with a couple of bags of weed in his pocket. Within 10 years, he would find himself in and out of the prison system another eight times, all for drug-related charges.

"That landed me in a cycle from there," he told Global Citizen. "I thought that was gonna be my whole life."

By the time he was 19, he was running a multimillion-dollar drug delivery business, and making more money than he knew what to do with.

He was arrested in 2009, for the last time, at 23, and sentenced to 12 years in prison. That was later reduced to seven, of which he ultimately only had to serve four.

But today, Marte is the head of a very different kind of business: a fitness company called ConBody, a "prison-style" bootcamp run and taught by formerly incarcerated people.

Frustrated by the difficulties he faced finding employment after being released from prison, Marte wanted to help other formerly incarcerated people make a living in an environment where they could be themselves and didn't have to hide their records. So, inspired by his own fitness journey, he started ConBody.

The business has not only helped thousands of people break a sweat, but, perhaps more importantly, it's helped dozens of formerly incarcerated people break the all too common cycle of poverty and re-incarceration.

Few things on the Lower East Side are the same as they were when Marte was a kid. And that includes the former Chevrah Kadisha Anshei Sochetchov Synagogue, whose second floor is now the location of ConBody.

The workout routines use the same kind of bodyweight exercises Marte did in his cell while incarcerated. When Marte arrived in prison, doctors told him his blood pressure and cholesterol were out of control and that he was likely to have a fatal heart attack within five years. But Marte didn't plan to die in prison.

"That motivated me to start working out in my cell and in the prison yard, and eventually I lost 70 pounds in six months by consistently running, working out," Marte said.

His fitness routine and progress caught the attention of other inmates. So he started training them, and helped 20 inmates lose more than a thousand pounds collectively. But it wasn't until he was sent to solitary confinement after an altercation with an officer that he came up with a plan to make fitness his new career.

"When I was in 24-hour lockdown, I had no other thing to do but just think and reflect about changing my ways and I had a sort of spiritual awakening," Marte said.

"I thought about fitness because that's what I was already doing. I was already helping people and I didn't want to go back to dealing drugs and going back into that lifestyle. I realized I had not only affected my family, but the thousands of people that I sold drugs to."

In March 2013, Marte was released. He came home to a world that was just different enough to be uncomfortably unfamiliar. MySpace was dead. Flip phones had been replaced by touchscreens.

"And I remember an officer telling telling me that the air smells different outside the cage, outside those fences - and it actually did."

But Marte said the real change was that his son, who was a toddler when he was incarcerated again, was now 6 years old and didn't know how to talk to his father if it wasn't through a prison payphone.

Readjusting was hard.

He still had plans to start a fitness business, but without any means to do so, he had to find another job first. Marte would sleep on his mom's couch and spend every day going from store to store looking for minimum wage retail jobs - but no one would hire him.

"Three felonies on my record ... It was like a stamp for life. So ConBody was basically born out of desperation," he said.

In the Lower East Side's Sara D. Roosevelt Park, where he played soccer as a kid and later sold drugs, he began approaching people with offers of training sessions. He started with the people he knew and eventually approached strangers to spread the word. From there, he rented out studios to teach classes, and entered business plan competitions for entrepreneurs, through which he was able to get more funding, until, in 2016, he was able to open ConBody's first permanent location - just blocks from where he'd once been arrested.

It's not just ConBody's workouts that are "prison-style" though. It's also the space itself. When class begins, a prison cell gate slams shut. There's a "mugshot wall" where clients can take photos after their workout with a sign bearing the business slogan: Do the time.

"A lot of people say it's a little bit gimmicky because of the mugshot wall and the prison gate and all that stuff," Marte said. But he feels it's his gimmick to claim.

"The reason why I did this and fitted out the whole space like this was I was just tired of hiding. I felt like this is freedom for me."

Instead of having to hide or be ashamed of his criminal record, Marte said that ConBody's theme empowers him and the other formerly incarcerated people he's hired to own their pasts. And, for once, the "gimmick" - their records - has been an advantage instead of a deal-breaker, setting them apart from other fitness companies.
"What happens next? Desperation."
To date, Marte has hired 26 other formerly incarcerated individuals and has seen a zero-recidivism rate, meaning no one has been re-incarcerated - his proudest achievement so far.

"That's pretty much unheard of by any nonprofit or for-profit business tackling the criminal justice space. And what we've done has worked. The community that we build has really changed a lot of perceptions," Marte said.

Not being able to find a job means many formerly incarcerated people struggle to afford food and housing. They're unable to support their families, and are either driven into or kept in poverty. And, studies have shown, that this can lead to higher rates of recidivism.

"You know, when you're released from a New York State facility, you're only given $40 dollars and a bus ticket. That money goes to your first meal at, like, McDonald's, and then the train system, and then you're pretty much broke," Marte said.

"What happens next? Desperation - and I want to eliminate that and I want to give people an opportunity," Marte said.

Only 55% of formerly incarcerated people report earnings in their first year after release, and those who are employed have a median annual income of $10,000, according to the Brookings Institution.
It's a loss for the country as a whole.
Approximately 2.3 million people in the United States are incarcerated, according to the Prison Policy Initiative. Most of them are poor - and many of them, after being incarcerated, will stay poor.

Many people enter prison poor, and leave even poorer. But even if a person is released from prison with what is technically enough resources to get back on their feet, they may ultimately find themselves on a "poverty path" because of the stigma of a criminal record, according to Ames Grawert, senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice.

Formerly incarcerated people are systematically shut out of a wide range of employment opportunities due to stigma, discrimination, and laws that prevent people with criminal records from working certain jobs or obtaining business licenses.

Grawert said communities and lawmakers need to start re-evaluating these long-held norms.

"At the state and community level, people have to start asking questions like: Do you really need a blemish-free criminal record to be a hairdresser? Do you need one to be an electrician?"

The unemployment rate among formerly incarcerated individuals is 27%, the Prison Policy Institute reported. That's "higher than the total US unemployment rate during any historical period, including the Great Depression," despite actively looking for employment at higher rates than the general population, according to the organization.

Every year, hundreds of thousands of people transition from jails and prisons back to their communities, and struggle to find employment, which isn't just a loss for them - it's a loss for the country as a whole.

The Center for Economic Policy and Research estimates the US economy loses somewhere between $78 and $87 billion annually, due to the exclusion of formerly incarcerated people from employment.

What is particularly puzzling about this is that formerly incarcerated people are often barred from jobs they performed while in prison.

While incarcerated, Marte worked as a customer service agent for the Department of Motor Vehicles. He was paid 10 cents an hour. But now that he's out of prison, it's unlikely he'd be hired for that position, given his criminal record.

Similarly, inmates in California can volunteer to work as firefighters - they are paid a comparatively high rate of $1 an hour - and receive official training. But once released from prison, their records prohibit them from actually becoming firefighters.

Marte said his ultimate goal for ConBody is to grow the business internationally, and eventually to franchise the model to hire as many formerly incarcerated people as possible.
"I'm going to spend the rest of my life here, might as well just adapt to the environment."
"I want to give them an economical, sustainable opportunity to really adapt back to society and help them not go back," he said.

When Marte's drug business was at its peak, he never imagined he would go into the fitness business.

In fact, when he was last arrested, he nearly gave up on his dreams of a future of any kind.

Marte received nine charges, of which he says he was probably guilty of only two. But with his bail set at $500,000, it was impossible for him to make bail and fight the other charges.

"When I was offered a half-a-million-dollar cash bail ... I lost hope."

Marte said he actually returned to his jail cell in Rikers Island, New York City's notorious jail complex, and smoked. He no longer cared about the consequences of violating the rules.

"I was like ... I'm going to spend the rest of my life here, might as well just adapt to the environment," he remembered.

So he stayed in Rikers for a year - he even got married to the mother of his child while there - until he was finally transferred to Greene Correctional Facility in upstate New York, where he served the majority of his sentence.

Being able to help fight the additional charges wouldn't have been the only advantage to being out on bail. Marte knew he was guilty and would be spending some time in prison for his actions.

"I feel like [being out on bail] is a fair chance for people to come home and actually join a program or something even if they're guilty of the crime," Marte said. "They could go back home be like, alright, I committed a crime and I need help ... whether that's a rehab program or finding a job and cleaning up before you see the judge again. I think it's just a better alternative to incarceration."

Marte said he met many people in arguably worse positions in Rikers - men who had been there for seven months, unable to afford a $1,000 bail, for jumping a subway turnstile, and others still who had spent two years in Rikers trying to fight their cases only to give up and plead guilty in hopes of being released sooner.

Even worse, many people were detained over $1 bails - a nominal amount sometimes set when a defendant is charged with multiple offenses. These $1 bails were frequently miscommunicated, and defendants were not allowed to pay for themselves, until the practice was eliminated in New York City last month, just weeks after New York State overhauled its cash bail system.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and state lawmakers passed a bill on March 31 that eliminated cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent crimes, which activists and advocates have recognized as a major step forward in addressing the criminalization of poverty.

The cash bail system was created to help ensure people charged with crimes would appear for their court dates. However, experts and criminal justice reform advocates say there is no strong evidence that people intentionally skip their court appointments.

"From our experience, we have always seen and continue to see the vast majority of our clients make all of their required court appearances," said Peter Goldberg, executive director of the Brooklyn Community Bail Fund.

The organization has paid bail for more than 4,300 people over the past four years and seen approximately 95% of its clients make their court dates.

"Some folks may need assistance with respect to a phone call reminder of the date, a MetroCard to get there, or help finding daycare, but the vast majority simply make their court appearances," Goldberg added. This is also the experience of bail funds around the country, he said.

What the cash bail system ultimately does is keep people who are not yet convicted of crimes in jail because they cannot afford their freedom. Cash bail not only discriminates against people living in poverty, but disproportionately affects communities of color - who are often also impoverished.

It's for that reason that experts and advocates say New York's cash bail reform measures don't go far enough to respect the liberty of those who have not been proven guilty of a crime yet and to prevent the criminalization of poverty. The reforms passed still allow judges to set bail for people accused - but not convicted - of "the most serious of offenses."

Goldberg said it's not yet clear how that will be applied to all cases. For instance, it's unclear whether Marte would have been eligible for bail or allowed to return home until his court date under these reforms.

"I think, in large part, the focus needs to shift back to our commitment to the presumption of innocence and our commitment to notions around due process and equal protection and the right to to a fair and speedy trial," Goldberg said.

He added that there is also a need to re-evaluate the degree to which people are arrested and prosecuted for what are essentially "crimes of poverty" - for example, crimes that result from not being able to pay a fee or fine.

Marte wants to do more than create employment opportunities for formerly incarcerated people. In the five years since Marte created ConBody, he's found his voice as an activist. And that's reflected in small changes in the studio.

The workout area of ConBody's first permanent location featured a barbed wire fence mural. At its new location, just two blocks away, posters bearing sobering statistics about mass incarceration in the US have replaced the fence. They serve as a reminder to clients who emerge from the workout "cell" dripping with sweat that these issues extend far beyond ConBody's walls and have impacted millions of people.

Marte hopes to challenge preconceived notions and stereotypes surrounding people who have been impacted by the criminal justice system.

The lockers in the studio don't actually have locks, a subtle effort to foster trust and build community. And he and his team have a great sense of humor, bringing laughter to gruelling workouts, instead of tears.

Yet, despite his success - ConBody is about to open its first international location - Marte said he still faces discrimination. Venture capital firms won't support him. And investors and traditional banks have turned him away because of his record.
This week Global Citizen is publishing a series of stories focused on the impact of cash bail and the criminal justice system on people affected by poverty. Go to End Bail, Fight Poverty to read these stories.
But he said he hopes to show people that formerly incarcerated are intelligent people with skills to offer and families to support.

"We just want a second opportunity ... a second chance," Marte said.

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The Surprising Mission Behind ConBody's "Prison-Style" Workouts

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Approximately 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the United States, and hundreds of thousands of people are in jail simply because they cannot afford to make bail. People involved with the criminal justice system often experience poverty both before and after detention.

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We are Global Citizens

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Bridgette and Candy - What is a Global Citizen?

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Bridgette and Candy - What is a Global Citizen?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
What Does it Mean to be a Global Citizen?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
UPDATED 10/9/18 The growing interconnectedness among people, countries, and economies means that there is a global dimension to who we are. The most positive way of responding to this is by pursuing a path of global citizenship. Global citizens see ourselves as part of an emerging world community, and are committed to helping build this community's values and practices.

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He Spent a Decade in Prison, now he's keeping people out of prison.

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He Spent a Decade in Prison, now he's keeping people out of prison.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Approximately 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the United States, and hundreds of thousands of people are in jail simply because they cannot afford to make bail. People involved with the criminal justice system often experience poverty both before and after detention. Coss Marte, founder of fitness studio ConBody, is helping formerly incarcerated people like himself find financial stability and opportunity. Criminal justice and cash bail reform are crucial to tackling the issues of poverty and discrimination in the US. You can take action here.
When Coss Marte walks around New York City's Lower East Side, he can barely take five steps before he's stopped by someone he knows. People come out of the corner bodega to dap him up, hop off bikes to say hi, or give slight nods as they pass by.

Marte was born and raised on the Lower East Side. He's seen it go from a crime-ridden neighborhood of abandoned and decrepit buildings to a site of trendy eateries and pricey cocktail bars. And the neighborhood, in turn, has watched the 33-year-old son of Dominican immigrants undergo his own evolution.
"I thought that was gonna be my whole life."
Marte was raised by a single mother who worked in a factory, and struggled to support their family on her low wages. They lived below the poverty line, he said, and he envied the things people around him seemed to have.

"The guys on the block had chains and money and clothes and everything I wanted that my mom couldn't provide for me," he recalled. "So as a kid, the people I looked up to were drug dealers."

At 13, he started selling drugs and was arrested for the first time with a couple of bags of weed in his pocket. Within 10 years, he would find himself in and out of the prison system another eight times, all for drug-related charges.

"That landed me in a cycle from there," he told Global Citizen. "I thought that was gonna be my whole life."

By the time he was 19, he was running a multimillion-dollar drug delivery business, and making more money than he knew what to do with.

He was arrested in 2009, for the last time, at 23, and sentenced to 12 years in prison. That was later reduced to seven, of which he ultimately only had to serve four.

But today, Marte is the head of a very different kind of business: a fitness company called ConBody, a "prison-style" bootcamp run and taught by formerly incarcerated people.

Frustrated by the difficulties he faced finding employment after being released from prison, Marte wanted to help other formerly incarcerated people make a living in an environment where they could be themselves and didn't have to hide their records. So, inspired by his own fitness journey, he started ConBody.

The business has not only helped thousands of people break a sweat, but, perhaps more importantly, it's helped dozens of formerly incarcerated people break the all too common cycle of poverty and re-incarceration.

Few things on the Lower East Side are the same as they were when Marte was a kid. And that includes the former Chevrah Kadisha Anshei Sochetchov Synagogue, whose second floor is now the location of ConBody.

The workout routines use the same kind of bodyweight exercises Marte did in his cell while incarcerated. When Marte arrived in prison, doctors told him his blood pressure and cholesterol were out of control and that he was likely to have a fatal heart attack within five years. But Marte didn't plan to die in prison.

"That motivated me to start working out in my cell and in the prison yard, and eventually I lost 70 pounds in six months by consistently running, working out," Marte said.

His fitness routine and progress caught the attention of other inmates. So he started training them, and helped 20 inmates lose more than a thousand pounds collectively. But it wasn't until he was sent to solitary confinement after an altercation with an officer that he came up with a plan to make fitness his new career.

"When I was in 24-hour lockdown, I had no other thing to do but just think and reflect about changing my ways and I had a sort of spiritual awakening," Marte said.

"I thought about fitness because that's what I was already doing. I was already helping people and I didn't want to go back to dealing drugs and going back into that lifestyle. I realized I had not only affected my family, but the thousands of people that I sold drugs to."

In March 2013, Marte was released. He came home to a world that was just different enough to be uncomfortably unfamiliar. MySpace was dead. Flip phones had been replaced by touchscreens.

"And I remember an officer telling telling me that the air smells different outside the cage, outside those fences - and it actually did."

But Marte said the real change was that his son, who was a toddler when he was incarcerated again, was now 6 years old and didn't know how to talk to his father if it wasn't through a prison payphone.

Readjusting was hard.

He still had plans to start a fitness business, but without any means to do so, he had to find another job first. Marte would sleep on his mom's couch and spend every day going from store to store looking for minimum wage retail jobs - but no one would hire him.

"Three felonies on my record ... It was like a stamp for life. So ConBody was basically born out of desperation," he said.

In the Lower East Side's Sara D. Roosevelt Park, where he played soccer as a kid and later sold drugs, he began approaching people with offers of training sessions. He started with the people he knew and eventually approached strangers to spread the word. From there, he rented out studios to teach classes, and entered business plan competitions for entrepreneurs, through which he was able to get more funding, until, in 2016, he was able to open ConBody's first permanent location - just blocks from where he'd once been arrested.

It's not just ConBody's workouts that are "prison-style" though. It's also the space itself. When class begins, a prison cell gate slams shut. There's a "mugshot wall" where clients can take photos after their workout with a sign bearing the business slogan: Do the time.

"A lot of people say it's a little bit gimmicky because of the mugshot wall and the prison gate and all that stuff," Marte said. But he feels it's his gimmick to claim.

"The reason why I did this and fitted out the whole space like this was I was just tired of hiding. I felt like this is freedom for me."

Instead of having to hide or be ashamed of his criminal record, Marte said that ConBody's theme empowers him and the other formerly incarcerated people he's hired to own their pasts. And, for once, the "gimmick" - their records - has been an advantage instead of a deal-breaker, setting them apart from other fitness companies.
"What happens next? Desperation."
To date, Marte has hired 26 other formerly incarcerated individuals and has seen a zero-recidivism rate, meaning no one has been re-incarcerated - his proudest achievement so far.

"That's pretty much unheard of by any nonprofit or for-profit business tackling the criminal justice space. And what we've done has worked. The community that we build has really changed a lot of perceptions," Marte said.

Not being able to find a job means many formerly incarcerated people struggle to afford food and housing. They're unable to support their families, and are either driven into or kept in poverty. And, studies have shown, that this can lead to higher rates of recidivism.

"You know, when you're released from a New York State facility, you're only given $40 dollars and a bus ticket. That money goes to your first meal at, like, McDonald's, and then the train system, and then you're pretty much broke," Marte said.

"What happens next? Desperation - and I want to eliminate that and I want to give people an opportunity," Marte said.

Only 55% of formerly incarcerated people report earnings in their first year after release, and those who are employed have a median annual income of $10,000, according to the Brookings Institution.
It's a loss for the country as a whole.
Approximately 2.3 million people in the United States are incarcerated, according to the Prison Policy Initiative. Most of them are poor - and many of them, after being incarcerated, will stay poor.

Many people enter prison poor, and leave even poorer. But even if a person is released from prison with what is technically enough resources to get back on their feet, they may ultimately find themselves on a "poverty path" because of the stigma of a criminal record, according to Ames Grawert, senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice.

Formerly incarcerated people are systematically shut out of a wide range of employment opportunities due to stigma, discrimination, and laws that prevent people with criminal records from working certain jobs or obtaining business licenses.

Grawert said communities and lawmakers need to start re-evaluating these long-held norms.

"At the state and community level, people have to start asking questions like: Do you really need a blemish-free criminal record to be a hairdresser? Do you need one to be an electrician?"

The unemployment rate among formerly incarcerated individuals is 27%, the Prison Policy Institute reported. That's "higher than the total US unemployment rate during any historical period, including the Great Depression," despite actively looking for employment at higher rates than the general population, according to the organization.

Every year, hundreds of thousands of people transition from jails and prisons back to their communities, and struggle to find employment, which isn't just a loss for them - it's a loss for the country as a whole.

The Center for Economic Policy and Research estimates the US economy loses somewhere between $78 and $87 billion annually, due to the exclusion of formerly incarcerated people from employment.

What is particularly puzzling about this is that formerly incarcerated people are often barred from jobs they performed while in prison.

While incarcerated, Marte worked as a customer service agent for the Department of Motor Vehicles. He was paid 10 cents an hour. But now that he's out of prison, it's unlikely he'd be hired for that position, given his criminal record.

Similarly, inmates in California can volunteer to work as firefighters - they are paid a comparatively high rate of $1 an hour - and receive official training. But once released from prison, their records prohibit them from actually becoming firefighters.

Marte said his ultimate goal for ConBody is to grow the business internationally, and eventually to franchise the model to hire as many formerly incarcerated people as possible.
"I'm going to spend the rest of my life here, might as well just adapt to the environment."
"I want to give them an economical, sustainable opportunity to really adapt back to society and help them not go back," he said.

When Marte's drug business was at its peak, he never imagined he would go into the fitness business.

In fact, when he was last arrested, he nearly gave up on his dreams of a future of any kind.

Marte received nine charges, of which he says he was probably guilty of only two. But with his bail set at $500,000, it was impossible for him to make bail and fight the other charges.

"When I was offered a half-a-million-dollar cash bail ... I lost hope."

Marte said he actually returned to his jail cell in Rikers Island, New York City's notorious jail complex, and smoked. He no longer cared about the consequences of violating the rules.

"I was like ... I'm going to spend the rest of my life here, might as well just adapt to the environment," he remembered.

So he stayed in Rikers for a year - he even got married to the mother of his child while there - until he was finally transferred to Greene Correctional Facility in upstate New York, where he served the majority of his sentence.

Being able to help fight the additional charges wouldn't have been the only advantage to being out on bail. Marte knew he was guilty and would be spending some time in prison for his actions.

"I feel like [being out on bail] is a fair chance for people to come home and actually join a program or something even if they're guilty of the crime," Marte said. "They could go back home be like, alright, I committed a crime and I need help ... whether that's a rehab program or finding a job and cleaning up before you see the judge again. I think it's just a better alternative to incarceration."

Marte said he met many people in arguably worse positions in Rikers - men who had been there for seven months, unable to afford a $1,000 bail, for jumping a subway turnstile, and others still who had spent two years in Rikers trying to fight their cases only to give up and plead guilty in hopes of being released sooner.

Even worse, many people were detained over $1 bails - a nominal amount sometimes set when a defendant is charged with multiple offenses. These $1 bails were frequently miscommunicated, and defendants were not allowed to pay for themselves, until the practice was eliminated in New York City last month, just weeks after New York State overhauled its cash bail system.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and state lawmakers passed a bill on March 31 that eliminated cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent crimes, which activists and advocates have recognized as a major step forward in addressing the criminalization of poverty.

The cash bail system was created to help ensure people charged with crimes would appear for their court dates. However, experts and criminal justice reform advocates say there is no strong evidence that people intentionally skip their court appointments.

"From our experience, we have always seen and continue to see the vast majority of our clients make all of their required court appearances," said Peter Goldberg, executive director of the Brooklyn Community Bail Fund.

The organization has paid bail for more than 4,300 people over the past four years and seen approximately 95% of its clients make their court dates.

"Some folks may need assistance with respect to a phone call reminder of the date, a MetroCard to get there, or help finding daycare, but the vast majority simply make their court appearances," Goldberg added. This is also the experience of bail funds around the country, he said.

What the cash bail system ultimately does is keep people who are not yet convicted of crimes in jail because they cannot afford their freedom. Cash bail not only discriminates against people living in poverty, but disproportionately affects communities of color - who are often also impoverished.

It's for that reason that experts and advocates say New York's cash bail reform measures don't go far enough to respect the liberty of those who have not been proven guilty of a crime yet and to prevent the criminalization of poverty. The reforms passed still allow judges to set bail for people accused - but not convicted - of "the most serious of offenses."

Goldberg said it's not yet clear how that will be applied to all cases. For instance, it's unclear whether Marte would have been eligible for bail or allowed to return home until his court date under these reforms.

"I think, in large part, the focus needs to shift back to our commitment to the presumption of innocence and our commitment to notions around due process and equal protection and the right to to a fair and speedy trial," Goldberg said.

He added that there is also a need to re-evaluate the degree to which people are arrested and prosecuted for what are essentially "crimes of poverty" - for example, crimes that result from not being able to pay a fee or fine.

Marte wants to do more than create employment opportunities for formerly incarcerated people. In the five years since Marte created ConBody, he's found his voice as an activist. And that's reflected in small changes in the studio.

The workout area of ConBody's first permanent location featured a barbed wire fence mural. At its new location, just two blocks away, posters bearing sobering statistics about mass incarceration in the US have replaced the fence. They serve as a reminder to clients who emerge from the workout "cell" dripping with sweat that these issues extend far beyond ConBody's walls and have impacted millions of people.

Marte hopes to challenge preconceived notions and stereotypes surrounding people who have been impacted by the criminal justice system.

The lockers in the studio don't actually have locks, a subtle effort to foster trust and build community. And he and his team have a great sense of humor, bringing laughter to gruelling workouts, instead of tears.

Yet, despite his success - ConBody is about to open its first international location - Marte said he still faces discrimination. Venture capital firms won't support him. And investors and traditional banks have turned him away because of his record.
This week Global Citizen is publishing a series of stories focused on the impact of cash bail and the criminal justice system on people affected by poverty. Go to End Bail, Fight Poverty to read these stories.
But he said he hopes to show people that formerly incarcerated are intelligent people with skills to offer and families to support.

"We just want a second opportunity ... a second chance," Marte said.

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The Surprising Mission Behind ConBody's "Prison-Style" Workouts

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Approximately 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the United States, and hundreds of thousands of people are in jail simply because they cannot afford to make bail. People involved with the criminal justice system often experience poverty both before and after detention.

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“I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world."

[As quoted in Plutarch's Of Banishment]”
― Socrates

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"The world citizen is a small leaf on the giant tree of life. They do not see a difference between the branch they were born on and the remaining branches on the tree, because they understand well that we are are all connected to the same roots. The world citizen sees each section of the world as part of their arm, leg, eyes, and heart. They do not class, contain or separate themselves or their identity by ethnicity or religion -- because they see their existence as a small part of a greater whole. When asked about their religion, the world citizen simply replies: 'My heart."
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

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"The world citizen is a small leaf on the giant tree of life. They do not see a difference between the branch they were born on and the remaining branches on the tree, because they understand well that we are are all connected to the same roots.

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Avon donates $100,000 to Malala fund to help girls get educated

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Avon donates $100,000 to Malala fund to help girls get educated

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The need for students to be able to empathize with others, value diverse perspectives and cultures, understand how events around the world are interconnected, and solve problems that transcend borders has never been greater. Just consider the recent attacks inspired by hate and terrorism in Orlando, Fla., San Bernardino, Calif., Brussels, Paris, Tunis, Istanbul, and Yemen, or the unparalleled flow of migrants-many of them children-from war- and violence-stricken regions in the Middle East and Central America. Then there's threat of damaging and deadly viruses such as Zika and Ebola hopping across people and countries.

The quick tick of news headlines exemplifies just how interconnected the world is today. It also points to the intercultural collaboration and problem-solving skills necessary to thwart the hatred that spawns terrorist attacks, successfully integrate culturally and linguistically diverse populations into classrooms and communities, and solve health and environmental crises.

Engaging students with the world is one step toward one day accomplishing such objectives. But what should educators teach to ensure that all students are prepared to successfully engage in the globalized world in which they already live? Furthermore, what steps can educators take to effectively foster globally minded knowledge, skills, and attitudes in students?

As part of the movement to educate the whole child and ensure students are challenged academically and prepared for participation in a global environment, the organization for which I work, ASCD, has launched an effort to focus on answering these questions. The place to start, I believe, is with some definitions on what global engagement means in a practical sense.

More Than a '21st-Century Skill'

For students to participate effectively in the global community, they will need to develop global competence: the attitudes, knowledge, and skills needed to live and work in today's interconnected world and to build a sustainable, peaceful, inclusive world for the future. Global competence is often, and rightly, labeled a "21st century skill" needed for employment in today's global economy. Yet global competence is so much more than a ticket to a competitive job. Students also need global competence to participate as empathetic, engaged, and effective citizens of the world.

What exactly does global competence entail? Many organizations have devised specific frameworks that define the term (see examples from the Asia Society, the OECD, World Savvy, and the Globally-Competent Teaching Continuum). These frameworks tend to coalesce around the following attitudes, knowledge, and skills:

* Attitudes: This includes openness, respect, and appreciation for diversity; valuing of multiple perspectives, including an awareness of the cultural and experiential influences that shape one's own and others' perspectives; empathy; and social responsibility, or a desire to better the human condition on a local and global scale.

* Knowledge: This refers to the ability to understand global issues and current events; global interdependence, including the impact of global events on local conditions and vice versa; the processes of globalization and its effects on economic and social inequities locally and globally; world history; culture; and geography.

* Skills: These includes the ability to communicate across cultural and linguistic boundaries, including the ability to speak, listen, read, and write in more than one language; collaborate with people who have diverse cultural, racial, linguistic, and socioeconomic backgrounds; think critically and analytically; problem-solve; and take action on issues of global importance.

Connecting Educators Across the World

Just as teachers of algebra know how to solve equations and music teachers know how to play scales, educators should also strive to develop these global competencies in themselves so that they can foster them in their students.

Engaging with the world is one way educators can develop global competence. Traditionally in the United States, educators as a whole have experienced limited training around global diversity. For example, very few teacher-preparation programs provide opportunities for preservice teachers to study abroad or require coursework in global topics. Therefore, connecting practicing teachers, principals, and district leaders across communities and continents through summits, conferences, exchanges, and virtual meetings geared towards common professional learning needs can provide experiences that help develop a globally oriented mindset, knowledge base, and skill set. Furthermore, when provided a platform to network, educators can lead the way in changing the broader education system locally and globally to better support the whole child and elevate the teaching profession.

A number of opportunities already exist for teachers to connect with one another across the world. There are an array of exchange programs run by the U.S. State Department and NGOs (e.g., American Councils for International Education, EF Tours, Teachers2Teachers-International) that provide educators with opportunities for meaningful cross-cultural interactions. And if travel is not always feasible due to financial or familial obligations, teachers can still engage with the wider world through virtual exchanges that connect classrooms across the globe as partners in learning activities that prepare students to be productive, engaged citizens of the world (for example, iEARN, Global SchoolNet).

Classroom Strategies

There are plenty of steps that educators can take today to put students on the path towards creating a better world for tomorrow. This doesn't require legislation that mandates a change in the curriculum, the introduction of a global studies course for graduation, or a line item from the state or federal budget. In a recent study of teachers committed to globally competent teaching, researchers found that the educators used the following common strategies to foster global citizenship and competency:

* Integrating global topics and perspectives across content areas. Globally competent teaching does not require a separate course or unit of study. Instead, teachers infused global content into the required curriculum, regardless of subject area. For example, math teachers used real-world global challenges as contexts for introducing new concepts (e.g., using word problems on population growth as a way to teach the rules of exponents) and language arts teachers used texts that represent diverse cultural perspectives and that take place in settings around the world to teach literature and informational texts.

* Providing opportunities for authentic engagement with global issues. Teachers provided real-world audiences for students to engage with around global issues. This took the form of pen pal and Skype exchanges with schools in other countries, service-learning projects emphasizing issues of global concern (e.g., access to clean water), or working in teams to devise and debate solutions to real-world problems, such as climate change, and sharing those solutions with government leaders. Notably, these activities were student-centered and inquiry-based.

* Connecting the global experiences of students and teachers to the classroom. Teachers adopted culturally responsive teaching practices that incorporated the cultures, languages, perspectives, and experiences of diverse students into curriculum and instruction. Teachers also incorporated their own cross-cultural experiences into the classroom through informal conversation, discussions around artifacts and photos, and lesson plans that incorporated knowledge gained and relationships built through their global experiences.

With these strategies in hand, the time is now for teachers to engage themselves, and their students, with the world. The lives of all students, no matter their zip code or their cultural, racial, linguistic, or economic background, are in some way influenced by the wider world. They too have the potential to shape that world. Their future, and the future of our world, depends on it.
What does global engagement mean to you? Why do you think it is important? Join the conversation by posting your reflections in the comments section.

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A Global Perspective: Bringing the World Into Classrooms (Opinion)

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The need for students to be able to empathize with others, value diverse perspectives and cultures, understand how events around the world are interconnected, and solve problems that transcend borders has never been greater.

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We are an action platform dedicated to achieving the end of extreme poverty, powered by a community of millions of Global Citizens who believe in one world, one people - where everyone has an equal chance to thrive.

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Inside Higher Ed | Higher Education News, Events and Jobs

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Editor's note: This guest entry was written by Madeleine F. Green, a Senior Fellow at NAFSA and the International Association of Universities. It was originally published in NAFSA's newish Trends & Insights series of short online article that are "designed to highlight social, economic, political and higher education system trends affecting international higher education." Our thanks to Madeleine and NAFSA for permission to post her fascinating entry here (which is also available as a PDF via this link). Kris Olds

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During the past decade higher education's interest in internationalization has intensified, and the concept of civic education or engagement has broadened from a national focus to a more global one, thus expanding the concept that civic responsibility extends beyond national borders.

As Schattle (2009) points out, the concept of global citizenship is not a new one; it can be traced back to ancient Greece. But the concept and the term seem to have new currency and are now widely used in higher education. Many institutions cite global citizenship in their mission statements and/or as an outcome of liberal education and internationalization efforts. Many have "centers for global citizenship" or programs with this label.

Additionally, national and international organizations and networks have devoted themselves to helping institutions promote global citizenship, although they do not necessarily use that term. For example, the Association of American Colleges and Universities sponsors a series of programs concerned with civic learning, a broad concept that includes several goals for undergraduate education: strengthening U.S. democracy, preparing globally responsible citizenry, developing personal and social responsibility, and promoting global learning and diversity. The Salzburg Seminar's International Study Program provides week-long workshops for faculty to consider the concepts of global citizenship and their integration into undergraduate education. It also provides college students with programs on global issues. The Talloires Network is an international alliance formed in 2005 that includes 202 institutions in 58 countries "devoted to strengthening the civic roles and social responsibilities of higher education." The Talloires declaration refers specifically to "preparing students to contribute positively to local, national, and global communities." Founded in 1985, the oldest of these networks, Campus Compact, retains its predominant, but not exclusive, focus on the United States.
Defining Global Citizenship
A foray into the literature or a look at the many ways colleges and universities talk about global citizenship reveals how broad a concept it is and how different the emphasis can be depending on who uses the term. This essay can only outline a few important elements of global citizenship, but a brief overview of the many meanings should help institutions formulate or clarify their own definition of it, identify those elements that are central to their educational vision, and add other dimensions. The following are among the most salient features of global citizenship (this section draws from a variety of sources but primarily relies on Schattle (2007)).

Global citizenship as a choice and a way of thinking. National citizenship is an accident of birth; global citizenship is different. It is a voluntary association with a concept that signifies "ways of thinking and living within multiple cross-cutting communities-cities, regions, states, nations, and international collectives..." (Schattle 2007, 9). People come to consider themselves as global citizens through different formative life experiences and have different interpretations of what it means to them. The practice of global citizenship is, for many, exercised primarily at home, through engagement in global issues or with different cultures in a local setting. For others, global citizenship means firsthand experience with different countries, peoples, and cultures. For most, there exists a connection between the global and the local. Whatever an individual's particular "take" on global citizenship may be, that person makes a choice in whether or how to practice it.

Global citizenship as self-awareness and awareness of others. As one international educator put it, it is difficult to teach intercultural understanding to students who are unaware they, too, live in a culture that colors their perceptions. Thus, awareness of the world around each student begins with self-awareness. Self-awareness also enables students to identify with the universalities of the human experience, thus increasing their identification with fellow human beings and their sense of responsibility toward them.

Global citizenship as they practice cultural empathy. Cultural empathy or intercultural competence is commonly articulated as a goal of global education, and there is significant literature on these topics. Intercultural competence occupies a central position in higher education's thinking about global citizenship and is seen as an important skill in the workplace. There are more than 30 instruments or inventories to assess intercultural competence. Cultural empathy helps people see questions from multiple perspectives and move deftly among cultures-sometimes navigating their own multiple cultural identities, sometimes moving out to experience unfamiliar cultures.

Global citizenship as the cultivation of principled decisionmaking. Global citizenship entails an awareness of the interdependence of individuals and systems and a sense of responsibility that follows from it. Navigating "the treacherous waters of our epic interdependence (Altinay 2010, 4) requires a set of guiding principles that will shape ethical and fair responses. Although the goal of undergraduate education should not be to impose a "correct" set of answers, critical thinking, cultural empathy, and ethical systems and choices are an essential foundation to principled decisionmaking.

Global citizenship as participation in the social and political life of one's community. There are many different types of communities, from the local to the global, from religious to political groups. Global citizens feel a connection to their communities (however they define them) and translate that sense of connection into participation. Participation can take the form of making responsible personal choices (such as limiting fossil fuel consumption), voting, volunteering, advocacy, and political activism. The issues may include the environment, poverty, trade, health, and human rights. Participation is the action dimension of global citizenship.
Why Does Global Citizenship Matter?
The preceding list could be much longer and more detailed; global citizenship covers a lot of ground. Thus, it is useful to consider the term global citizenship as shorthand for the habits of mind and complex learning associated with global education. The concept is useful and important in several respects.

First, a focus on global citizenship puts the spotlight on why internationalization is central to a quality education and emphasizes that internationalization is a means, not an end. Serious consideration of the goals of internationalization makes student learning the key concern rather than counting inputs.

Second, the benefits of encouraging students to consider their responsibilities to their communities and to the world redound to them, institutions, and society. As Altinay (2010, 1) put it, "a university education which does not provide effective tools and forums for students to think through their responsibilities and rights as one of the several billions on planet Earth, and along the way develop their moral compass, would be a failure." Strengthening institutional commitment to serving society enriches the institution, affirms its relevance and contributions to society, and benefits communities (however expansive the definition) and the lives of their members.

Third, the concept of global citizenship creates conceptual and practical connections rather than cleavages. The commonalities between what happens at home and "over there" become visible. The characteristics that human beings share are balanced against the differences that are so conspicuous. On a practical level, global citizenship provides a concept that can create bridges between the work of internationalization and multicultural education. Although these efforts have different histories and trajectories, they also share important goals of cultural empathy and intercultural competence (Olson et al. 2007).

No concept or term is trouble-free; no idea goes uncontested by some faculty member or group. For better or for worse, global citizenship will undoubtedly provoke disagreements that reflect larger academic and philosophical debates. There is plenty of skepticism about global citizenship. Some object to any concept that suggests a diminished role for the nation and allegiance to it or the ascendancy of global governance systems. The idea of developing students' moral compasses can raise questions about whose values and morals and how institutions undertake this delicate task. Some students will choose not to accept responsibility for the fate of others far away, or may see inequality as an irremediable fact of life. Some faculty will stand by the efficacy and wisdom of the market; others will see redressing inequality as the key issue for the future of humankind. And so on.

Such debates, sometimes civil or acrimonious, are, for better or worse, the stuff of academe. Implementing new ideas-even if they have been around for a very long time as in the case of global citizenship-can be slow and painful. However, if colleges and universities can produce graduates with the knowledge and the disposition to be global citizens, the world would certainly be a better place.
Madeleine F. Green
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Box 1 - Conceptual Divides
What was once simply called "international education" is now a field awash with varied terminology, different conceptual frameworks, goals, and underlying assumptions.*

Although "internationalization" is widely used, many use globalization-with all its different definitions and connotations- in its stead. Rather than take on the job of sorting out the terminology, let me point out two significant conceptual divides in the conversation. Both center on the purpose of internationalization.

In the first divide, we see one face of internationalization as referring to a series of activities closely associated with institutional prestige, profile, and revenue. These activities are generally quantifiable, lend themselves to institutional comparisons and benchmarking, and provide metrics for internationalization performance that resonate with trustees and presidents. Examples include hosting international students, sending students abroad, developing international agreements, and delivering programs abroad.

The other face of internationalization-student learning- is much more difficult to capture and assess, but it provides an important answer to the "so what?" question. Why does internationalization matter? What impact do internationalization activities have on student learning? How do they contribute to preparing students to live and work in a globalized and culturally diverse world?

Different terms with overlapping meanings are used to describe the student learning dimension of internationalization. Global learning, global education, and global competence are familiar terms; they, too, are often used synonymously. The global in all three terms often includes the concepts of international (between and among nations), global (transcending national borders), and intercultural (referring often to cultural differences at home and around the world).

Also prevalent in the student learning discussion is another cluster of terms that focus specifically on deepening students' understanding of global issues and interdependence, and encouraging them to engage socially and politically to address societal issues. These terms include global citizenship, world citizenship (Nussbaum 1997), civic learning, civic engagement, and global civics (Altinay 2010). These terms, too, share several key concepts, and are often used interchangeably.

The second divide focuses on the divergent, but not incompatible goals of workforce development (developing workers to compete in the global marketplace) or as a means of social development (developing globally competent citizens.) Global competitiveness is primarily associated with mastery of math, science, technology, and occasionally language competence, whereas "global competence" (a broad term, to be sure), puts greater emphasis on intercultural understanding and knowledge of global systems and issues, culture, and language.

As the field grows increasingly complex and the instrumental goals of internationalization become more prominent, it is important that campus discussions and planning efforts sort out their language, underlying concepts, and implied or explicit values. Otherwise, people run the risk of talking past each other and developing strategies that may not match their goals.

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* It is important for U.S. readers to note that the goals of and assumptions about internationalization vary widely around the world. The Third Global Survey of Internationalization conducted by the International Association of Universities found that there are divergent views among institutions in different regions of the risks and benefits of internationalizations. Based on their findings, IAU has launched an initiative to take a fresh look at internationalization from a global perspective.
References
Altinay, Hakan. "The Case for Global Civics." Global Economy and Development Working Paper 35, The Brookings Institution, Washington, DC, 2010.

Nussbaum, Martha. 1997. Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press.

Olson, Christa, Rhodri Evans, and Robert Shoenberg. 2007. At Home in the World: Bridging the Gap Between Internationalization and Multi-Cultural Education. Washington DC: American Council on Education.

Schattle, Hans. 2007. The Practices of Global Citizenship . Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

Schattle, Hans. 2009. "Global Citizenship in Theory and Practice." In The Handbook of Practice and Research in Study Abroad: Higher Education and the Quest for Global Citizenship, ed. R. Lewin. New York: Routledge.

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Global Citizenship - What Are We Talking About and Why Does It Matter?

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During the past decade higher education's interest in internationalization has intensified, and the concept of civic education or engagement has broadened from a national focus to a more global one, thus expanding the concept that civic responsibility extends beyond national borders.