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Elaine Cartas (Roxanne Conlin Fellow)

Elaine Cartas reports in from the campaign trail. Here are some of her thoughts as the summer comes to a close, with a couple of pictures to give you a closer peek at what it’s like in the office (after the jump): Ten weeks. It doesn’t even feel like ten weeks. It feels like I’ve been a field organizer my whole life. Every morning, I wake up excited – thrilled to see our volunteers. It is the volunteers that make my 11 hour day go by quickly. Each one is filled with enthusiasm, a quirky personality, and great stories about why they support Roxanne Conlin. I’ve been able to start developing wonderful relationships with each of them. Then there’s the love and hate relationship I have with the VAN. I can assure you, it wasn’t love at first sight – but I am starting to fall in love with the benefits of the VAN. Within ten weeks, we’ve been able to reach 300 volunteers and each week our volunteers make thousands of calls. There’s still more to accomplish. Thus, I’ve decided to stay till November fighting for Roxanne Conlin, and more importantly for all Progressives.

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Expanding SNAP’s Impact: Next Steps for the Future

Posted by John Riley | Posted in Uncategorized | Posted on 13-11-2009

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Dear Friends,

After the success of the 2008 election and our endorsement of Tom Geoghegan last spring, we have spent the last months reflecting on what SNAP has accomplished and we are headed.

After four years, we have seen that SNAP’s model, providing fellowships to students to work on progressive congressional campaigns, has worked. Over 40 students have worked on more than 20 campaigns, helping to elect 12 progressive leaders to Congress.

Now we must make sure that this opportunity is available to as many students as possible. It is time for our organization to expand its impact.

To that end, we are pleased to announce two new members of SNAP’s team: Rhiannon Bronstein, our new Executive Director, and Kendra Green, our first Director of Development and Outreach.

A junior at Yale University, Rhiannon had her first opportunity to work on a political campaign as a SNAP Fellow in the summer of 2008, working on Darcy Burner’s congressional campaign in Washington State. Since then, she has worked in politics from the local to the federal level, and she will bring her enthusiasm for student organizing to SNAP.

Kendra Green joins SNAP with an extensive background within the democratic and progressive movement. She was recently a development coordinator with Progressive Majority and prior to that she worked for several other 527’s and PACs. Kendra began interning on campaigns while a student in college at Randolph-Macon Women’s College, where she received her B.A. in Political Science and Women’s Studies in 2000.

These are big steps for the organization. In bringing on our first Director of Development and Outreach, we are confident that SNAP will be able to exponentially expand its impact on progressive politics.

At this crucial moment, we can’t allow the progressive change we need to slip away, and we can’t lose the momentum of the student activism that played such an important role last November. We know that the 2010 election must send an important message to Washington: that change has only just begun and that progressive elected officials and students across the country will be working tirelessly for the values we believe in.

And, for this, we need your support. Between now and December 31, we must raise $15,000 to begin our expansion. Please contribute today to support progressive leadership throughout the country.

Thank you so much for your continuing support!

Sincerely,

Hugh Baran & Margaret Sharp
Executive Directors, Students for a New American Politics PAC

http://www.snappac.org/contribute

P.S. We want to thank everyone who made these last four years for SNAP possible. Leaving SNAP is not easy for the two of us. It has been a powerful incubator for our own values, skills and commitments. SNAP is truly unique in progressive politics in its deep belief in the power and vision that students can contribute to our movement. We are grateful to you for recognizing our potential in these early years, and we thank you for your continuing commitment to our vision. As we move on to continue our work within the progressive movement, we know that we are leaving SNAP in good hands.

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