On April 20-22, 2007, millions of young people across the world will participate in the 19th Annual National & Global Youth Service Day. With the help of parents, teachers and volunteers, these children will take part in a variety of community-service and service-learning projects.

The event mobilizes young people to identify and address community needs through volunteer service. It also educates the public about the role of youth as leaders and contributors to the well-being of their communities. Past projects have tackled issues such as climate change, disaster relief, literacy, poverty and urban decay.

Additional information, as well as planning tool kits, curriculum guides, posters and grant money for projects, is available at www.ysa.org.  

Identify theft can be a nightmare in terms of time and money. Each year, millions of consumers have their identities stolen. There is no foolproof way to avoid ID theft, but the Federal Trade Commission says there are ways to minimize the chances of becoming a victim and the damage done if your identity is stolen.

The FTC is asking educators to help raise awareness about ID theft and how to protect against it. The commission’s program, “Deter, Detect, Defend: Avoid ID Theft,” offers a kit containing materials, including a PowerPoint presentation, that can be used to educate anyone about ID theft. Social networking Web sites, scholarship scams and offers of credits are just some of the ways through which young adults are having their identities stolen.

“People whose identities have been stolen can spend months or years—and thousands of dollars—cleaning up the mess the thieves have made of a good name and credit record,” according to the FTC booklet, “Fighting Back Against Identify Theft.”

The materials, which are available in English and Spanish, can be ordered at www.FTC.gov/bulkorders.htm.  

“Integrating with All Deliberate Speed,” a new lesson plan on the civil rights movement, has been developed by the National Visionary Leadership Project. The multimedia unit for middle and high school teachers includes video clips, a timeline, photographs, historical documents and other resources.

Each lesson takes students behind the scenes of the civil rights movement through first-person accounts from Coretta Scott King, James Meredith, Andrew Young, Dorothy Height, Bob Moses and Constance Baker Motley, among others.

The personal stories of these noted Americans give students rare access to the private realities behind historic events such as the 1963 March on Washington, the Brown v. Board of Education legal battle and the 1964 Freedom Summer voting rights campaign.

The unit is available for free at www.visionaryproject.org/teacher.