Young People Changing the World at We Day Seattle 2017

I did­n’t get to attend this year’s We Day Seat­tle 2017 event on April 21, but it looks like it was incred­i­ble, as usu­al! The event was co-found­ed by change­mak­er Craig Kiel­burg­er, who is pro­filed in Be a Change­mak­er: How to Start Some­thing that Mat­ters, and it is all about young peo­ple and com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice. Despite the star-stud­ded line­up, you can’t buy a tick­et to WE Day—students from across the coun­try earn their way by the actions they take on one local and one glob­al cause of their choice. WE Day is free of charge to stu­dents and edu­ca­tors, thanks to the gen­er­ous sup­port of Microsoft and The All­state Foundation.
“Every year, more than 200,000 stu­dents from over 10,000 schools around the globe earn their tick­ets to WE Day through the year­long WE Schools pro­gram, cre­at­ing pos­i­tive impacts in their com­mu­ni­ties,” says Craig. “WE Day Seat­tle will unite and cel­e­brate thou­sands of young lead­ers who are work­ing pas­sion­ate­ly for the caus­es they care about most, cre­at­ing sus­tain­able change in their own back­yards and around the world.” And it looks like it once again did just that.

Craig and Marc Kielburger and Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll at We Day Seattle 2017
Craig and Marc Kiel­burg­er and Sea­hawks Coach Pete Car­roll at We Day Seat­tle 2017 (Pho­to Cred­it: Suzi Pratt/ Get­ty for WE Day)

As report­ed on Geek­Wire:

Write down your goals, lis­ten more, and dream big.

These are good pieces of advice for any­one, real­ly, but they held spe­cial impor­tance for more than 15,000 stu­dents who gath­ered inside an ener­getic Key Are­na on Fri­day in Seat­tle for WE Day, an annu­al event that cel­e­brates youth empowerment.

Astro­naut Buzz Aldrin told kids:

“No dream is too high,” Aldrin told the crowd. “I know because I am liv­ing proof.”

Buzz Aldrin at We Day Seattle 2017
Buzz Aldrin at We Day Seat­tle 2017 (Pho­to Cred­it: Suzi Pratt/ Get­ty for WE Day)

Seat­tle Sea­hawks quar­ter­back Rus­sell Wil­son, a WE Day Seat­tle co-chair, told them:

“I hope every­body in this room is writ­ing down their goals and what they want to do in life,” he said. “Once you set those goals out, go achieve them. But you can’t achieve them alone — you need to achieve them with oth­er peo­ple.” –Rus­sell Wilson

Russell Wilson at We Day Seattle 2017
Rus­sell Wil­son at We Day Seat­tle 2017 (Pho­to Cred­it: Suzi Pratt/ Get­ty for WE Day)

Many more stars were in atten­dance, too. What a treat for the young peo­ple in attendance!
And what a ben­e­fit to our local com­mu­ni­ties, as well. Dur­ing the 2015–2016 school year, WE Schools groups in Seat­tle vol­un­teered more than 500,000 hours for local and glob­al caus­es and raised more than $900,000 for more than 600 local orga­ni­za­tions. Since 2007, WE Schools have raised near­ly $80 mil­lion and vol­un­teered more than 27 mil­lion hours for var­i­ous causes.
Who says kids can’t change the world? It looks to me like they already are.

We Day Seattle 2017
We Day Seat­tle 2017 (Pho­to Cred­it: Suzi Pratt/ Get­ty for WE Day)

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