Hey, Have you witnessed bullying or school violence? Are you doing anything about it? I am! I belong to an organization where youth can make a difference…Students Against Violence Everywhere (SAVE).

SAVE began in 1989 when a young man named Alex Orange lost his life while trying to break up a fight at a party. Alex could have been just another statistic of another young life lost to violence. But the following Monday, his grieving classmates gathered in West Charlotte High School's cafeteria and vowed to organize against violence in Alex's memory. The group formed Students Against Violence Everywhere (SAVE), with the vision that all students will be able to attend a school that is safe, secure, free of fear, and conducive to learning.

Every year SAVE has activities in which many chapters participate in such as America Safe Schools Week, activities conducted during this week draw attention to the continuing problem of school violence and educate everyone about how schools can be made safer and more secure. Also during Safe School's Week, we have National SAVE Day in which chapters all across the nation celebrate SAVE by having tons of fun activities! And the National SAVE Rock-a-thon is where chapters and communities have an opportunity to come together and raise proceeds and awareness for achieving the mission of Students Against Violence Everywhere!

SAVE also has a National Youth Board (YAB) in which I am Chair of; it is made up of high school youth from across the nation who come together and be the role models and spokespersons of SAVE. They are the ones plan everything from the Educational Components to the National SAVE Summit details. Serving on the board takes many hours of service during the school year. On average, most members contribute over 300 hours of time with work for the YAB, work with their chapter, and individual projects or presentations. Serving as a member of this prestigious and select group requires commitment, dedication and sacrifice of time and often other organizational events. This year we have 7 YABs from North Carolina, Illinois, Wisconsin, Oklahoma and Colorado. We all got together in the summer for a leadership institute where we were trained to be leaders and presenters and to speak to youth about our cause.

In just 18 years, SAVE has expanded
from that first chapter in Charlotte, North Carolina, to over 200,000 members in over 1,7600 SAVE chapters across the U.S. Today, SAVE serves youth in elementary schools, middle schools, high schools, colleges, and community youth-serving organizations in 45 states and several foreign countries. To learn more about SAVE and how you can be involved, visit www.nationalsave.org