Saturday 20 Feb 2010
Tonight from 4pm until 9:30pm the Equal Education Bookery was full of people doing an unusual but vital form of activism. About 25 EE activists spent hours typing up the thousands of petitions we have collected over the past months.
Well over 20,000 people have signed the petition demanding a National Policy on School Libraries. We need the information in electronic format so that we can send bulk sms's to everyone who has signed the petition, reminding them of the march and other activities. We will keep their details and use these in future for other campaigns.
We had 18 laptops going at once, music, some snacks and regular water refills on a boiling hot evening. See the picture attached to this e-mail. We did not finish all the petitions, and another few sessions will be needed, hopefully with new people so that the hard-workers from today can get a break.
I want to use this opportunity to thank Yoni Bass who is spending the month of February working full-time on this campaign and doing a really good job. Well done also to the teams that went out this morning to collect new signatures in different parts of Cape Town.
EE is making headway with this campaign. Recent interactions with the Minister of Basic Education's office and with the Minister of Finance show that EE is gaining traction for its ideas and proposals. The DA's new Education Campaign is a bad imitation of the work we are doing. People are talking about EE and school libraries.
Tomorrow when we wake up it will be Sunday 21 February, precisely four weeks, precisely one month, until the big event in Cape Town. Lets make it a huge month that secures us the libraries policy we want.
Doron Isaacs
EE Coordinator
