|
Corporation News
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION:
Carnegie Corporation of New York
Office of Public Affairs
(212) 207-6273
Carnegie Corporation
And Time Magazine To Convene Summit On Citizenship And Service
Presidential
Candidate John McCain and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
to Participate. Presidential Candidate Barack Obama Expected to
Participate.
New
York, New York, July 21, 2008—Carnegie Corporation of New
York and TIME are convening a national bipartisan summit
in New York City that will bring together hundreds of leading Americans
to plan and lay out a bold blueprint on citizen service. The announcement
was made by TIME Managing Editor Richard Stengel in the
“To
Our Readers” section of the magazine’s current issue
(July 28, 2008).
Presidential
candidate John McCain will join ServiceNation
– a new coalition of more than 100 groups dedicated to strengthening
American democracy and solving problems through civic engagement
and citizen service – for an historic presidential candidates
forum the evening of September 11 in New York City. Presidential
candidate Barack Obama has also been invited to participate.
“Volunteerism
is the cornerstone of American democracy,” said Vartan Gregorian,
President of Carnegie Corporation. “As Alexis de Tocqueville
noted in his classic 1835 book, Democracy in America, the efforts
of both individual Americans and citizens' associations have played
a critical role in preserving and strengthening our nation. We continue
to see the proof of that dedication to service in the fact that
there are more than 1.4 million nonprofit organizations in the U.S.
addressing the challenges facing Americans across all social, cultural
and economic levels."
“I
hope the Summit will re-kindle the spirit of the 1960s, when President
John F. Kennedy reminded us that, as citizens, we should not just
think of ourselves but of our nation; not just of our rights but
also of our responsibilities and obligations. Andrew Carnegie would
certainly have agreed. He believed that with private wealth comes
public obligations and that with citizenship comes service. The
time has come to reaffirm those principles and, once again, to reinvigorate
the spirit of service among Americans of all ages."
The
Summit will launch an ambitious, one-year national campaign by ServiceNation
(http//www.servicenation.org). The goal of ServiceNation, which
includes more than 100 organizations representing some 100 million
Americans, is to inspire America’s leaders to expand volunteer
and national service opportunities for all Americans; use proven
service strategies to create targeted service corps that will tackle
some of America’s most chronic social challenges; and call
on all Americans to make service a core ideal of citizenship.
|