Students from 25 Toronto Catholic schools were gathered for the annual conference at St. Michael’s College School, where Kielburger was the keynote speaker.
“This morning is an opportunity to be inspired but we want the students to actually be able to take action, tangible action, on the inspiration that they hear about social justice,” said Kielburger. “It’s wonderful to talk about these things, it’s wonderful to have these conferences — they’re so meaningful and they’re so powerful — but unless something tangible comes of it it will be a day of inspiration without a tangible outcome.”
During the 45-minute address, throughout which Kielburger frequently used videos to reinforce the inspirational message of young voices making a change, he noted three essential steps towards successful social justice activism.
“Seek first to understand and be understood,” said the 36-year-old Brebeuf College School alumni who along with his brother Craig run the charity Free the Children. “Make sure when you are tackling social justice, that you really understand these issues inside-out so you can articulate, so you can be compelling, so you can be effective. Knowledge is power.”
To articulate the next point Kielburger borrowed a Spanish word, minga, from a lady he met while building a school in Ecuador.
“It means bringing people together that can actually move the needle on issues because if you do it alone you aren’t going to be successful.”
Driving home the importance of gathering collectively, even if that gathering represents a small portion of the population, Kielburger told the story of how Craig, who after reading about the murder of a young Pakistani sweatshop worker who’d been speaking out against child labour, rallied just four per cent of his classmates together to begin what would become Free the Children.
The organization, founded in 1995, has grown from having a presence in one Toronto classroom to having contributed to the construction of more that 650 schools across the developing world.
Kielburger’s final point was about action itself.
“This generation has an opportunity to really get engaged and this generation is doing so,” said Kielburger. “But the reality is that they need to lead not just from their sentiment, they need to lead from tangible action and if they do so I think 20, 30 years from now the world will fundamentally be a
different place.”
Kielburger also cautioned students against what he called the attitude of “slacktivism — I’m only going to be involved in clicking a mouse on a Facebook page and I’ve done my duty to create social justice.”
Olivia Rossetti understood and tried to live out Kielburger’s message before attending the conference, which has been running annually for more than a decade.
President of the St. Joseph’s College School’s student council, Rossetti, 17, said she’s used her term as president to engage her fellow students in charitable events. Among those was a penny drive for the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace which raised more than $17,000 — or 1.7-million pennies.
“Social activism at the teenage level is so vital to our development and our success as teenagers,” said the Grade 12 student. “Once you get involved you’ll make some great friends, you’ll discover much more about yourself especially at such a critical age and you’re in such a developmental part of your life that you can grow and flourish from these experiences with other people who are passionate about the same things as you are.” Kielburger said engaging youth is key because they are the world’s future.
“We’ve largely given up on the adults, we think that young people are the ones that will steer us in the right way,” he said. “Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of caring, awesome, wonderful adults out there, but this next generation is way ahead of us and that’s where we want to make the investment. This is a long-term play, it’s a long-term investment and when you’re investing for the long-term you need to start with the youth.”
After Kielburger’s address students participated in one of 30 workshops. Themes included social media, the practice of faith and inclusiveness among others.