In November, Mike Trummel (COL ’10) won a $3,000 Reimagine Georgetown Grant from The Corp, co-sponsored by GUAFSCU and The Hoya, to start DC Students Speak, a grassroots student advocacy group. “Because there is little interaction with other DC students, there is consequently little opportunity to organize and have DC students’ voices heard,” Trummel wrote in his original project proposal.

Now, DCSS has launched their website, which Trummel said is the first step to achieving their goal of better connecting D.C. college students to lobby for student interests, like addressing 61-D violations.

“Our vision of this website is that it can be used as a tool for students to better understand the challenges that students collectively face,” writes DCSS. “More than just raising awareness, DC Students Speaks also strives to be an advocacy organization, with the aim of mobilizing DC students to work together towards common goals.”

The site, which launched on Tuesday, aggregates content from student publications at five area schools, American, Catholic, Howard, George Washington, and Georgetown, and it is looking to expand to include Trinity and UDC. On their events page, you can join their listserv, become a student representative for your school, or look for information on how to get involved in their events, like their first annual conference of area students at Georgetown in September.

“If we work together, we can become a voice that students use to make sure their concerns are heard,” DCSS says. “It’s time to organize.”

As one its many philanthropy initiatives, the Corp annually doles out Reimagine Georgetown grants to programs that “seek to improve our undergraduate experience at Georgetown in creative ways.”  In recent years, grants—which are co-sponsored by GUASFCU and The Hoya—have gone to now-well-known initiatives like Run for Rigby and 25 Days of Service.

According to Chairman of the Reimagine Georgetown Board J. Ryan Zambon (MSB ’10), the program received more than 20 grant applications this year.  Yesterday, the Board announced that it had narrowed the proposals down to four winners:

• Georgetown Alternative Music Series: $5,000 will go towards Daniel Alexander’s (MSB ’11) idea of creating a series of on-campus concerts featuring student and local bands.
• D.C. Students Speak: Michael Trummel (COL ’10) will be getting $3,000 to establish an annual conference between student leaders at all of the major D.C.-area universities to coordinate student response to issues like 61-D citations.
• Saxa Service Feast: $2,000 will go to Joel Ziebell (COL ’10) to host a wing-eating contest for students and faculty.  The event will raise money that will be donated to the winning team’s charity of choice.
• Diversability: Tiffany Yu (MSB ’10) is starting a club to promote “disability pride.” The group is in the process of getting SAC approval, and will be receiving $500 to get off the ground.

You can check out the full descriptions for the winning programs after the jump!

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