DC Conference Day 3

Lobby Day! Having packed our bags, we left at 8:30 to get to our 8:30 meeting with Gabrielle at Rep. Keating's office.

The students gave an excellent presentation on why we care about these issues, and on our specific legislative asks - support for bills to address the issues in Syria and Yemen and Burma.

After the presentation, we were treated to a tour by Harwich alum, Tyler Nickerson, who is interning in the office.

TNick gave an awesome tour, knowing that there is no such thing as too much historical detail for our group. From there, we headed to lunch at the Senate Dining Hall - always a treat! We then had a 2pm meeting in Sen. Warren's office with Feras Sleiman (who we have met with more than any other staffer - four times?), and a 3pm meeting with Andrew Zack in Sen. Markey's office.

The students again impressed with their knowledge and commitment to these issues. After these meetings, we had time for a brief visit to the Library of Congress before heading to the Metro to get back to Crystal City.

We shuttled to the hotel to grab our bags, and then to the airport to catch our 7:30 flight to Logan, which was a bit delayed. After finally getting to Boston, we had to wait for the last P&B bus to the Cape, getting home around 1am. A long journey as always, but a great one!

DC Conference Day 2

After getting up and grabbing some breakfast, we headed to the Metro to get to our conference at Impact Hub by 10. We were thrilled to see Mac Hamilton, STAND Executive Director, and Grace Fernandes from the national leadership team (both Harwich/Monomoy alums). The conference was a pretty intense review of the situations in Burma, Yemen, and Burundi, and we also had time to prepare for our presentations for Lobby Day tomorrow.

Following the conference, we grabbed a bite at Shake Shack, then did our night monument tour - for the first time we did it as a walking tour, starting at the White House, then heading to the MLK, FDR, and Lincoln memorials, and well as the Korean and Vietnam memorials.

The last bit of our walk got interesting, as we hiked over to the Arlington Cemetery stop, only to find that it was closed after 8, so then finding our way to the Pentagon stop, and then a short Metro ride to Crystal City, and finally our shuttle to the hotel. Time for sleep!

DC Conference Day 1

Welcome to our DC Conference Tip for 2017-2018! This year, our travel day happens to be Veteran's Day, so we arranged an early flight to Reagan National Airport in order to be able to attend the ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

We started on the 3am bus from Exit 6 to Logan. Meeting the rest of the group at Logan, we got on our 7am AA flight to DCA.

We landed at 9, grabbed our bags, caught the shuttle to the Courtyard by Marriott Crystal City, dropped our bags, then headed to the Metro. Our timing worked well, and we got through security and walked up to the pavilion in time for the ceremony. Then it was delayed awaiting the Vice President's arrival. Fortunately we found seats in the sun - it was 20 degrees.

We also were treated to patriotic songs from the Marine Corps band while we waited, then enjoyed a parade of Veterans organizations, and a series of rousing speeches.

It took a while to get out of there after the ceremony, and we visited the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and stopped at JFK's grave on our way out.

We decided to walk by the Lincoln Memorial, past the reflecting pool, stop briefly at the WWII Memorial, and then past the Washington Memorial to grab a quick bite from the food trucks.

We then spent the rest of the afternoon at the Holocaust Museum - powerful as always, especially for those for whom it was their first visit.

After the visit, we headed back to Crystal City to grab some food and then settle in to our rooms, and an early bedtime to recover from the day of travel.

DC Trip 17 Day 3 - Lobby Day

Day 3 - optional run with the usual suspects at 715. Checked out of the hotel at 9 and lugged our bags up Capitol Hill to Keating's new office in Rayburn. We did our first presentation to Gabrielle - his foreign affairs aide.

To summarize: Cesca and Tori introduced us, Colleen and Charbel gave personal testimonials about why we are passionate about these issues, Julie and Erin gave a summary of the background to these conflicts, Izzy and Grace did our first ask to be a co-sponsor on the soon-to-be-introduced Genocide and Atrocity Prevention Act to make permanent the Atrocities Prevention Board and the Complex Crisis Fund, Jack and Ben did our second ask to push for level-funding the International Affairs budget and UN support (the President has proposed 29% and 50% cuts) and to sign letters in Congress supporting this, Emma and Livia did our third ask to take a strong stand against the President's executive orders on refugees and immigration and to sign on to the bills opposing these, Pat did our fourth ask to co-sponsor the Caesar Syria Protection Act when it gets re-introduced to impose new sanctions on the Assad regime, Katie and Ryan asked for follow up questions and info, and Graham and Patrick did our concluding thank you. They did a great job impressing Gabrielle with their expertise and advocacy. Keating is already a big supporter and is strategically placed on the Foreign Affairs committee - and is on board with our asks. Following the meeting we walked down to the Capitol Visitor Center and took at tour with Anne Marie and Jen. Always a highlight to see the rotunda and statues etc.

After the tour we took the tunnel over to the Senate cafeteria for lunch - one of our favorite places to eat. We then did a meeting in Sen. Warren's office with Feras, the third time we've met with him. He was impressed as usual (do you know a lot about these issues? I do thanks to STAND (!)) and the kids did another great job. For Ms. G, visiting Warren's office was like a pilgrimage to Mecca.

For the first time in six hours we got to go outside and it had turned from a cool foggy morning to a warm sunny afternoon. Some of us took the chance to visit SCOTUS for a court room lecture while others opted to catch a few rays on the marble steps.

We headed next to our final presentation in Sen. Markey's office to Matthew. He was likewise appreciative and impressed us since the Sen. had recently been in a meeting pushing Sec. Tillerson on famine issues. Our day nearly at an end, we walked back across Capitol Hill to get our bags in Rep. Keating's office.

As we got through security in Rayburn, the door to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce Hearing Room was open so we ducked inside to see if we could check it out. Turns out the Oregon delegation staff was just cleaning up a spread of food for some constituents. They offered us the leftovers and we didn't say no. Go Ducks!

So we finally got to Keating's office, retrieved our bags, and just as we were about to get on the elevator, out walks Rep. Keating himself! Not only did he pose for a picture with us, but he then talked with us about human rights issues and other topics (AHCA is the worst bill I've ever seen) for a half hour! This was an unexpected treat and a great capstone to our trip.

We trudged back across the Hill with our bags to Union Station, had dinner in the food court, then got on a train to BWI.

Finally we got on our flight at 1030, arrived at Logan at midnight, got in our carpools, and got home ~2am. See you in school tomorrow! (I mean today)

DC Trip 17 Day 2

Day 2: Started with optional run around Capitol Hill at 645 and optional Mass at 8. Props to Graham and Jack for opting in on both. Mass at beautiful little church - St Vincent de Paul's.

Left hotel at 930 - much cooler than yesterday. First stop was at Air and Space for an hour visir.

Then we headed to the new National Museum of African-American History and Culture - we were very lucky to get tickets having reserved them two months ahead.

The museum has three floors of history below ground and three levels of culture above ground. The long line was to see the history section - warms a history teacher's heart.

We were at the museum for almost four hours, and I spent the whole time in the history floors - kind of inverse to the Holocaust Museum, you start at the bottom and work your way up chronologically from early slavery to the present.

Highlights included the many tributes to great leaders,

and the section on Emmitt Till featuring the casket he was originally buried in (long line to see this, no pics).

Will have to go back several times before really seeing the museum.

Great cafeteria too. From there we took a nice walk down Constitution Ave

to Impact Hub for our STAND conference run by Mac Hamilton (HHS alum). Colin and Kori helped, and our keynote was by Myra, a refugee from the violence in Burma.

We were brought up to date on a variety of crises that STAND is pushing for our government to act on. We learned the issues to prepare for our Lobby Day presentations tomorrow. Kept the synapses firing with pizza and salad. The conference consisted of our group of 22 and 24 from Pathfinder Tech in Palmer, MA. We then went together on a three hour Monument Tour - White House, Iwo Jima, Jefferson, FDR, MLK, Lincoln, Vietnam, and Korea.

Got back to the hotel at 10 - took a while to settle down from a busy day - excited and nervous to lobby tomorrow.