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Dear Friends,

Yesterday, we completed a giant first step in this historic year of 2008. Together, we built the biggest national teach-in in history, mobilizing close to a million students, educators and citizens for a national brainstorm on global warming solutions.

Spend a day or a week to take it all in: see What Happened. Who Came. Read about it in The New York Times, The LA Times or The New Jersey Star Ledger. If you haven't seen it yet, take the time to watch The 2% Solution. Then ask-did we succeed? How far have we moved? And how far do we have to go-this year?

So do take a deep breath-and then get back to it!

CAMPUS TO CONGRESS: Make a plan to visit your member of congress - every member of congress - with the Choose Your Future solutions. Set the date for Tuesday, February 19th, when he or she will be home for the President's Day recess. Contact us for more information.

CONTINUE TO FOCUS THE NATION: Focus the Nation is supporting actions in April to raise awareness about global warming solutions. You'll be hearing from us about this in February.

GREEN VOTE: If you do one thing during Earth Month, register to vote. In fact, register 100 people to vote! After that, work for the clean energy candidate of your choice.

MAKE NOISE: Organize an Earth Day climate action. Join the student clean energy campaigns at Energy Action, the Student PIRGS, or the Sierra Student Coalition. Join the 1-Sky Campaign, Interfaith Power and Light, or your regional climate group. Always, keep the pressure on Congress.

FEBRUARY 2009 WILL BE A CRITICAL MONTH IN HUMAN HISTORY. The new President and Congress will be setting their agenda-and that agenda will determine if the climate can stabilize at a heating of 3-4 degrees F, or instead 5-10 degrees F.

FEBRUARY 5TH 2009, we will again call on educational, faith and civic institutions to Focus the Nation, and demand real solutions to global warming.

BETWEEN 1960 AND 1964, Americans moved from fatalistic acceptance of racial segregation to a solid determination to end Jim Crow. Between now and the end of 2008, we can move this country from a fatalistic acceptance of business-as-usual global warming. We can end the paralyzing sense that our children must accept from us an impoverished planet. We can stop global warming.

Thanks for the work you have done.

The Focus Team: Eban Goodstein, Chungin Chung, Garett Brennan, Minna Brown, Scott Highleyman, Hyunsun Park, Alex Tinker, Kate Stratton, Peter Viola, and Laura Westwood.

Thanks to Our Media Partners. Grist has recently provided links to great content to help educators prepare for teach-in sessions. Think MTV is promoting Project Slingshot, three $10,000 summer scholarships for climate leaders. Sponsored by CLIF Mojo, and Focus the Nation.

FOCUS PHONE-IN Join us for the next half-an-hour conference call to share information and respond to questions. Wednesday, February 6th, at noon Eastern, 9 Pacific Time. Calls will be every Wednesday at that time, so mark your calendars! Call in to 1-218-339-7800, passcode 1312008.

Focus News:

  • Join Sherry Beall, host and producer of Healthy Planet, Healthy Me! radio show interviewing Eban Goodstein and Focus the Nation organizers from around the country from 2-3pm PST Friday Feb. 1 for a discussion on what we've accomplished so far and where the movement will go from here.
  • Listen live from anywhere in the country at http://www.hphme.com/ or http://www.kpfk.org/ ; KPFK 90.7FM in , 98.7FM in. KPFK, "Powered by the People" Stay tuned!
  • Project Slingshot: Three $10,000 summer scholarships for climate leaders. Sponsored by Clif Mojo and Focus the Nation.
  • Envision 2050: Poster contest for high school and middle school students. Is the Future Nature? Win an outdoor adventure trip!
  • HS Teachers-need lesson plans on global warming? Check out the resources from Earth Day Network and ClimateChangeEducation.org.
  • National Campus Energy Challenge. Join schools across the country and see what you can save in February!
  • Forty Percent of Car Trips are within two miles of your home: Take Clif Bar's Two-Mile Challenge and ride or walk instead! Check it out.
  • Donate to Focus-Stop Your Junk Mail! Sign up with 41 Pounds, and a portion of the income is donated directly to us here at Focus the Nation.
  • The President's Climate Commitment: Has your University or College President signed on?
  • Share how Focus the Nation affected you - Take the climate change survey.

New Books on Fighting Global Warming

On video: Jon Isham and Eban Goodstein talk about their recent books on building the global warming solutions movement - Fighting for Love in the Century of Extinction, and Ignition. Other recent books of note: Gary Braasch's Earth Under Fire; Laurie David's Down to Earth Guide (for elementary school); and  Fight Global Warming Now from Step it Up.

Global Warming Organizing Films: Everything's Cool (Dan Gold and Judith Helfand); Revolution Green (Stephen Stout and Jessica Kelly)

Focus Update is the e-bulletin of Focus the Nation. If would prefer not to receive this update, please reply to this message with UNSUBSCRIBE in the header.

Eban Goodstein
Project Director
Focus the Nation
info@focusthenation.org
www.focusthenation.org
503-768-7996
 
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