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• Human Rights Activism for Youth
• Overview
• Become an Individual Youth Member
• Sign up now!
• Get Involved!
• Amnesty's Youth and Student program
• Individuals can make a difference
• Clubs and Groups
• Take Action
• Youth Action Toolkit
• Planning 101
• Starting a Group
• A Guide to successful fundraising
• How to plan your year
• Meeting 101
• Your first meeting
• How to facilitate a meeting
• Brainstorming
• Icebreakers
• Communications 101
• Raise awareness @ school
• Tabling 101
• How to give an in-class presentation
• Media 101
• How to give an interview
• How to write a press release
• Action 101
• Guide to letter-writing
• Creative Action
• Individual Activism
• Resources
• Links
• Fieldworkers
• Glossary of terms
• Quotes
• Downloadable stuff

Your first meeting

Meetings are important because they relationships between group members and are an easy way to get things done. Plus, meetings can be lots of fun! Dare to make your meetings a little unusual!

Two excellent rules for anyone holding a meeting:

KEEP IT SHORT - like most classes, the longer meetings run, the less interesting they become. Ensure that the chairperson/facilitator (the person in charge of running the meeting) has a watch or clock, and isn't afraid to keep the meeting moving along. At the beginning of the meeting, agree to certain amounts of time you will spend on certain issues, and stick to that! If you absolutely have to have a long meeting, give people short breaks for food and water to help them concentrate better.

GET THINGS DONE - a good meeting ends with a sense of accomplishment. Something has been decided, planned, learned or shared. People feel that they gained something valuable in exchange for their time. Even if your meeting is only to plan or organize, set objectives for your meeting and do your best to accomplish them!

The Agenda: It's a Beautiful Thing

An agenda is basically a "to-do" list for your group to get through during the meeting. Agendas can help set goals and objectives for the meeting, as well as establishing time lines to get work done. See the bottom of this fact sheet for a sample agenda you can tailor to fit your meeting.

People you will need to have at your meeting:

CHAIRPERSON/FACILITATOR: This person is in charge of the smooth running of the meeting. They encourage members to share their opinions, and determine an order of speakers, if necessary. Try to rotate this position regularly among members of your group. Be sure to read How to Facilitate A Meeting (another handy item in our activist toolkit) to help prepare.

SECRETARY/RECORD KEEPER: This person records what goes on at the meeting, including decisions made and who is responsible for them. Though they don't always have to create formal "minutes", you may wish to e-mail out these notes to all group members to keep them on top of what's going on.

How to Get the Word Out

In order to get people out to your first meeting, they're going to have to know about your first meeting. The easiest and most time-tested method of advertising is word of mouth. Tell your friends, get them to tell their friends, etc. But this is definitely not enough.

A great compliment to any word-of-mouth advertising is to create a short pamphlet. Be sure to give the name of your club, date, time and location of first meeting and a quick description of Amnesty's human rights work. You might want to steal the AI logo (link to tools and resources in toolkit) off our web site. Make sure the pamphlet is no more than ½ page in size and easily photocopy-able.

If it's snazzy enough, you may wish to turn your pamphlet into a poster. Amnesty has a number of nice posters to choose from, but don't be afraid to make your own!

Another method most high schools use is the announcements or PA system. Many high schools having morning announcements where information about clubs and teams is given you. Talk to your staff advisor or administration to see if you can advertise there.

Finally, use your imagination. You know your school better than we do. Is there a school newsletter? Announcements at assemblies? Are you allowed to use sidewalk chalk to advertise in front of your school? Can you talk about Amnesty in a law, English or social science class? There are plenty of ways to get the word out that Amnesty has started at your school.

During the Meeting

First, check out the list of do's and don'ts in How to Facilitate a Meeting. This will give you a good idea of how to include people in your meeting.

Second, be organized. Do your homework. Know what needs to be said and who's going to say it. Try to anticipate different questions people might have and what topics might need to be discussed. People will appreciate that you're using their time effectively.

Third, relax! If your first meeting turns out totally unlike how you'd imagined it, don't worry! Sometimes creative people get together and things turn out way better than they could have been planned. If a lively discussion starts, or people don't want to follow your well-organized plan, be ready to go with the flow. Remember that a group belongs to all it's members, so give the members an opportunity to choose the direction of your group.

A Few Final Tips

• Take people's information. Send around a sign-up sheet with sections for name, contact information and interests so that you know a little bit about your group, and can contact them if you need to.
• If at all possible, set the next meeting time. This way all of your members are definitely aware when to meet again.
• Refreshments are always a good way to break the ice and get people mingling. You may wish to provide snacks after the meeting to encourage people to hang out and talk to each other.