What is an Advocate?

I am trying to see how I could become an advocate for people on disability, the disability affecting your breathing, in what department for transportation!

I, for one, have been having a problem with transportation during the summer months. I could barely go outside due to the quality of the air, so how am I expected to withstand getting in a van in 90 degree weather without air-conditioning? I finally switched to another provider, and lo and behold, no air-conditioning and it is 85 degrees with high humidity. The reason give was they were low on fuse, but how is that my problem? This is torture for me and I am sure I am not the only person out there going through this. What and where do I go to voice my concerns and be heard?

If you are interested in becoming an advocate for a cause, and wish to do so informally, a great tool to utilize is social media. With the ability to reach millions of people with the click of a mouse, online advocacy is growing at a huge rate.

For example, getting people to sign a digital survey is just as effective as a traditional survey, but people are more accessible and often more amicable to filling in something online, rather than being stopped in the street.

Other popular ideas are making interactive sites that teach people about your cause and adding pages to the most popular social networking sites. You can get a huge following for your cause with just a little work.

If you are passionate about a topic, there is a good chance you can become an advocate for your cause. Getting involved in the things you believe in is a great way to give back to your community and become more fulfilled in life.

While not everyone has a university degree and can get into advocacy as a career, you can easily join an organization that is already focusing on the movement of your choice.

If you think the need to go green is vital, volunteer at your local chapter of one of the great environmental groups. Attend meetings, get informed and spread the word.

@sweetPeas- A fairly large literacy advocacy organization in the United States is the John Corcoran Foundation. You can apply to volunteer your skills as a literacy tutor from time to time, and they always appreciate the support of passionate volunteers!

I have always been interested in teaching literacy. For many years, I taught English as a Second Language. Now that I am retired, I would like to begin volunteering. There are many American adults who cannot read or read at a very low level.

Volunteering as a reading tutor would be very rewarding for me. Not being able to read affects their self esteem, ability to get jobs, filling out necessary forms, and just the pleasure of reading an interesting book.

Being an advocate for the literacy program and actually volunteering is something I hope to do in the near future.

I have an intense interest in becoming an advocate for early childhood education - especially for the poor and disadvantaged. Studies have shown that those who receive care and nurturing from 0-3 years, are much less likely to need special education, welfare assistance or prison. These all cost lots of money, but expanding the Head Start Program is well worth the extra money.

The government needs advocates, as well as the administrators and the workings of the system.

I hope I can find a niche to work in.

@Sunshine31 - That sounds like a great volunteer opportunity. I did want to say that being a disability advocate or a special education advocate is also very rewarding.

Often people with disabilities are able to do the work that other can do, but just need some minor modifications. I think that legislation like the ADA act really has come a long way in making sure that employers do what they can to accommodate those with disabilities.

Children with special needs can work in a mainstream classroom for special subjects like art and music, but for the core subject like math and reading they could receive special attention in a pull out program so that this way they get the extra help that they need and get to socialize with kids their own age which makes them feel more connected to their class.

A while back when I was in college, I was interested in becoming a child advocate for minor children needing help with respect to the legal system. The program was called a Guardian Ad Litem program that was a volunteer program in which a lay person got trained to represents the interest of a minor child at a court hearing.

Usually this guardian worked with the social workers and the judge to make sure the child is properly being taken care of because children in this program to don’t have parents that they can count on which is why the court looks to these guardians as another person that could check on the child to make sure that they are okay.

It is a really rewarding job and often the guardian is the only positive influence in the child’s life. I did not sign up to be a guardian because I had to commit to serve for a year and the training was too intense and interfered with my school schedule.