The 2007-2008 EarthRights School Burma (ERSB) students ran a successful campaign as part of a course on strategic campaigns held at ERSB from July 1 to 3, 2008. Targeting the ERSB staff, the goal of the campaign – determined by the students themselves - was to create a process through which the students would contribute to the creation of the school’s curriculum for next year. The students reached an agreement with the staff for a meeting to be held on July 14, 2008, to discuss next years’ curriculum, and if this meeting is successful, the process of consultation will continue in the future.

The students are very happy with the school’s current curriculum but they thought that slight changes based on their experience as students might improve it for future years.

“We want to recreate the curriculum with less time for some subjects and more time for others. As a result, we created a campaign and succeeded in our request for a two hour meeting with ERSB staff,” said one of the ERSB students.

The students noted that even though they were successful in obtaining a meeting with staff to discuss curriculum development, they faced many challenges and difficulties in doing so. The students used several campaign strategies and five tactics in the campaign, including dialogue and meetings with staff, phone calls to “actors” who then pressured staff, and one peaceful demonstration at the school directed at ERSB staff.

First, two student representatives had dialogue with staff and then the students contacted actors who then influenced the staff. These tactics were not completely successful, so the students then choose another two representatives from their group for dialogue with school staff and they arranged for the two teachers of strategic campaigns class to apply pressure to the school staff. These tactics were also ultimately unsuccessful.

Finally, the student representatives negotiated again with the staff, this time accompanied by a demonstration with posters and slogans. At this point they reached a binding, signed agreement with the staff regarding a process for students to have input into curriculum development.

“We got a lot of experience from this campaign; in both theory and practice. We ERSB students now understand practical methods for campaigns, and that is why we were successful in our campaign,” noted one of the students.