Charlie, a senior at Southampton High School in New York has been an IC supporter for most of his high school career. His involvement reads like this: Watched an IC film, organized an assembly, met some Roadies, started an IC club, became president, partook in the 2011 Fourth Estate Summit, led a lobby meeting, and attended MOVE:DC. Did we mention he’s still in high school?
Needless to say, we weren’t the only ones impressed with his repertoire. The Holocaust Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau County named Charlie as the Upstander of the Month for April 2013. Here’s what they had to say about Charlie:
During his sophomore year, Charlie Margaritis learned of gross human rights violations during the ongoing war in Uganda. In that conflict, tens of thousands of children were abducted, enslaved or murdered. He could not remain a bystander. He chose another path – to become an Upstander. He educated his peers about the conflict and reached out to Invisible Children in San Diego. He decided to organize a school-wide assembly at which the representative of Invisible Children spoke about the crisis in Uganda. A Southampton High School Chapter of Invisible Children grew out of the assembly, spearheaded by Charlie who remains its President. He also founded and is President of Key Club International at his school.
Charlie has widened the scope of his activism to try not only to help the children of Uganda, but to stop the war altogether. He lobbied Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, to keep military advisors in Central Africa. He joined MOVE:DC last November in Washington, DC to raise awareness about Uganda and to support the President’s ground-breaking legislation identifying Joseph Kony as a war criminal. In addition, last summer, Charlie attended a peace and leadership conference titled Fourth Estate.
Charlie was one of the hundreds who attended the first Fourth Estate Summit in 2011.
It’s supporters like Charlie Margaritis that make Invisible Children what it is. This August we’ll be bringing together 1,400 of amazing advocates just like Charlie to join us for the The Fourth Estate Leadership Summit in Los Angeles. We want you to be there – yes, you. The Summit is a four-day conference, Invisible Children style. That’s a thousand students learning about justice, advocacy, and global citizenship through new IC media, amazing speakers, tangible action steps, and, obviously, an epic dance party.
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