For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
July 30, 2002
President Celebrates USA Freedom Corps Six-Month Anniversary with New
Public Service Ads and Breakthrough Web Site
Today's Presidential Action
? President George W. Bush marked the six-month anniversary of
his USA Freedom Corps by launching a public service advertising
campaign and redesigned and upgraded web site that will help Americans
answer his ?Call to Service.?
? The public service advertising campaign features the President
and several celebrities, including New York Yankee Mariano Rivera,
actress Angie Harmon, and former Senators Robert Dole and John Glenn.
The campaign titled ?Everyone Can Do Something,? includes television
and radio ads in English and Spanish, as well as print ads and web
banners.
? The redesigned web site, usafreedomcorps.gov, includes the USA
Freedom Corps Volunteer Network ? the most comprehensive clearinghouse
ever offered to help individuals find service opportunities in their
hometowns, across the country, or around the world.
Background
President Bush created the USA Freedom Corps to engage Americans in
volunteer service and to create a culture of service, citizenship, and
responsibility in America's communities. At the same time, he called
on all Americans to dedicate at least two years of their lives ? the
equivalent of 4,000 hours ? in service to their communities, our
country, or the world.
? The challenge the President issued is significant ? research
shows that community involvement and volunteer service in the United
States have been steadily declining over the past three decades.
? Research also shows that two of the main reasons individuals
give for not volunteering are that they were never asked or didn't know
where to start. The President has asked every American to get
involved, and the USA Freedom Corps Volunteer Network offers Americans
millions of places to start.
A Busy Six Months
Over the past six months, the USA Freedom Corps has stimulated
tremendous growth in volunteer service opportunities and
federally-supported public service programs. In addition, the USA
Freedom Corps has been working throughout the non-profit sector and
with as many businesses as possible to create new resources for
individual volunteers and to stimulate organizations to play a
meaningful role in encouraging and enabling all Americans to answer the
President's ?Call to Service.?
? VolunteerMatch, one of the members of the Network, already
reports that since the launch of the USA Freedom Corps, more people are
going online to get involved in their communities. In just the last
quarter, VolunteerMatch has measured a 72 percent increase in its
matching activity as measured against the same period in 2001.
? Federally-supported public service and volunteer opportunities
at the Peace Corps, Corporation for National and Community Service and
Citizen Corps have marked major increases in volunteer interest since
the President's ?Call to Service.?
? More than 66,000 potential Peace Corps Volunteers have
requested applications since the President's State of the Union address
? a 40 percent increase over the same period in 2001. During the same
period the Peace Corps has opened or re-opened programs in East Timor,
Peru, Bangladesh, Macedonia, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan,
and sent out 13 assessment teams. In addition, 34 countries have
requested Peace Corps volunteers since the State of the Union address.
? The number of potential AmeriCorps members is growing, with a
90 percent increase in online applications compared with pre-State of
the Union levels. President Bush has proposed increasing the number of
AmeriCorps members and reforming the programs run by the Corporation
for National and Community Service ? and the Citizen Service Act that
would carry out those reforms was approved with bipartisan support by
the House Education and the Workforce Committee in June.
? Potential volunteers with Senior Corps, another Corporation
for National and Community Service program, have contributed to a 57
percent jump in web visitors since January.
? More than 45,000 individuals signed up online to participate
in the newly-created Citizen Corps. They join hundreds of thousands of
individuals already volunteering at the local level with Citizen
Corps-supported programs including CERT, Neighborhood Watch, and
Volunteers in Police Service. More than 140 communities around the
country have officially registered Citizen Corps Councils to coordinate
local emergency prevention, preparation and response volunteer
activity. All state and territorial governors have appointed a Citizen
Corps point of contact, and all states and territories will be
receiving grants from FEMA to support the development of local Citizen
Corps activities.
? On more than 35 trips around the country, President Bush has
met with volunteers who are answering his ?Call to Service? to
highlight their volunteer service as an example of the dedication he is
hoping to instill in all Americans through the USA Freedom Corps.
? In June, President Bush met with business leaders who are
working on a self-directed effort to get businesses involved in
supporting and promoting volunteer service by their employees and
customers. Financial services companies, grocers, hospitality
companies and entertainment and media businesses are among those who
have already made major commitments to support volunteer service in
response to the President's ?Call to Service.? These companies have
announced new policies, including paid leave time for employees to
participate in volunteer service, sponsorship of volunteer projects
involving employees, and the creation of resources to engage customers
in volunteer service.
Everyone Can Do Something
? The advertising campaign includes television, print, radio,
and web products. New York Yankee Mariano Rivera appears in English
and Spanish language versions of a radio and television ad, actress
Angie Harmon appears in a second television and radio ad, and former
Senators Robert Dole and John Glenn appear together in a third radio
and television ad. President Bush appears in each of the ads, saying
?When you help your neighbors, you help your Nation. Everyone can do
something.?
? The public service advertisements are the result of a
production relationship with the Corporation for National and Community
Service and the Ad Council. Support from the Department of Justice and
a gift from the Walt Disney Company to the Corporation for National and
Community Service made the campaign possible.
The USA Freedom Corps Volunteer Network
The web site is the concrete representation of the USA Freedom
Corps Volunteer Network ? a massive web-based public-private enterprise
that enables volunteers to search according to their interests and
their geographic location, from the largest clearinghouse of volunteer
opportunities ever assembled.
? At launch, the web site will offer opportunities to work with
more than 50,000 organizations around the country and the world, with
more organizations soon expected to come on board. The number of
volunteers each organization needs varies ? the Peace Corps can use
3,500 individuals for a particular type of opportunity each year, but a
local church may need only five volunteers to help at its food pantry ?
and the USA Freedom Corps estimates that the organizations now online
are looking for the assistance of millions of Americans to help meet
community needs in the United States and abroad.
? The search function of the web site draws upon well
established non-profit organizations, including America's Promise, the
National Mentoring Partnership, Points of Light Foundation, SERVEnet,
the United Way, and VolunteerMatch, as well as the federal government
agencies that are a part of the USA Freedom Corps Coordinating Council
? the Corporation for National and Community Service, Peace Corps, and
Citizen Corps. The Department of the Interior is also a founding
partner in the USA Freedom Corps Volunteer Network, and its one-stop
registration center for government agencies that need volunteers can
also be accessed through the new search function.
? The redesigned web site and USA Freedom Corps Volunteer
Network are a landmark e-government initiative ? bringing publicly and
privately supported volunteer opportunities together and putting them
just one click away from a potential volunteer.
? The redesign of the web site and the creation of the new
search function was made possible through a gift to the Corporation for
National and Community Service from Network for Good, a non-profit
organization working to advance e-philanthropy and non-profit adoption
of the Internet that was founded by a partnership of non-profit
organizations and Internet companies, including AOL Time Warner
Foundation and AOL, Inc., the Cisco Foundation and Cisco Systems, Inc.
and Yahoo! The Corporation for National and Community Service will
maintain the web site through a gift of support from the UPS
Foundation.
Find Out More
Explore the USA Freedom Corps Volunteer Network now at
usafreedomcorps.gov and use the newly designed web site as a resource
for helping your neighbor ? and your Nation.
###
|