Building CAN at march on the Pentagon

[Chris Schwartz]

This is Chris at CAN's University of Wisconsin chapter. Below are a few quick things about this weekend's March on the Pentagon that will hopefully be helpful for building CAN. We will quickly discuss some of these ideas and others for building CAN at a CAN contingent Prep Meeting:

CAN Contingent Prep Meeting

When: 11am Saturday

Where: At the corner of Henry Bacon Dr. and Constitution Ave (where the Youth and Student contingent will meet; look for the CAN banners)

To Discuss: Building CAN with sign-up sheets, chants & effective marshalling (preliminary tips below)

Building CAN: On our campuses and on new campuses

Our Wisconsin bus is bringing many students who aren't (yet) active in our chapter and a handful of activists from other campuses with newer antiwar coalitions that are unconnected to the rest of the student movement. We are using the March on the Pentagon to build CAN  on both fronts: 1) to those students at our school to join our existing chapter and 2) to convince students from other schools to affiliate with CAN.

CAN SIgn-up Sheets: coordinated by Chris Schwartz (Iowa): 319-230-5677

Last week on the conference call CAN voted to have our contingent meet up and march in unity with the "Youth & Student" sector of the March on the Pentagon (map: http://answer.pephost.org/site/PageServer?pagename=M17_youth ). This means that CAN will have a great opportunity to raise its slogans (Troops Out Now! College Not Combat! etc) through chants and banners to attract new student groups to affiliate with CAN (a vibrant, energetic CAN contingent will also make it easier to convince students at campuses with existing chapters to get involved too!). In this vein, Chris Schwartz (Iowa) is bringing loads of clip-boards and CAN sign-up sheets. Each school should designate a handful of members to help Chris circulate the sign up sheets. Most importantly: Return the sign-up sheets to Chris!!

Marshalling the CAN chapter coordinated by Chris Dols (Wisconsin): 608-215-7035

Our ability to attract students - by projecting CAN clearly through chants and banners - depends on having the tightest possible grouping of CAN chapters into a coherent contingent. This works best if there are a handful of "marshalls" whose primary purpose is to keep all the CAN chapters together and invite students to join our part of the march. Students will be attracted to our chants and our slogans so we should be aggressive inviting them to join us. I (Chris from Wisconsin) will be coordinating this effort. We'll be bringing matching arm-bands for marshalls to wear. 

Bring your school's CAN Banner and Bullhorn

Part of "projecting CAN" is literally projecting our voices... with bullhorns! So if your chapter has a bullhorn bring it. Got two? Bring both. The more the better. Also if your chapter doesn't yet have a banner that says which school you're with, then maybe that's something you can throw together in the next couple days. School banners help give a sense of how widespread the student antiwar movement is growing!

I hope that is helpful. If you get to Washington early enough, be sure to join the CAN Prep Meeting at the corner of Henry Bacon and Consitution at 11am!

-Chris Dols

chri...@mac.com

608-215-7035