We Day: "The Super Bowl for doing good"

When Canadian Craig Kielburger was 12 years old, he was paging through the Toronto Sun, in search of the comics. This was 1995, and instead of reading the funny papers, he happened upon a front-page story about a young boy from South Asia who was sold into slavery.

The headline: "Battled Child Labor, Boy, 12, murdered." Moved by the story, Kielburger brought it to school and asked his classmates for help to combat child labor. Eleven students raised their hands.

"I felt connected to that story because we were the same age," said Kielburger, now 31. "That was really the day Free The Children was born." Co-founded by Kielburger, Free The Children is today an international charity, with more than 2.3 million youth involved in global education and development programs.

Kielburger, along with several celebrities and motivational speakers, will take the stage Nov. 12 at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul for the second We Day Minnesota. More than 18,000 students and educators from roughly 500 schools will attend the daylong event, officials say.

We Day, started in Canada in 2007 by the nonprofit Free The Children, is considered one of the world's largest youth-empowerment events. More than 200,000 students from the U.S., Canada and the United Kingdom have taken or will take part in similar events throughout the year, officials say.

"We Day has been called the Super Bowl for doing good, and there's really nothing like it," said Minnesota native David Stillman, director of Free The Children-USA. "It's high energy and it's fun. What we're trying to do is instill in kids that it's cool to care, that any one person can make a difference in the world. We Day is a celebration and a kickoff to creating local and global change in the future."

Stillman said you can't buy a ticket to We Day Minnesota. Students earn their free tickets through public service and philanthropic actions.

According to Stillman, We Day is connected to the yearlong We Act program, which provides educational resources and established campaigns to help students "turn inspiration into sustained action." Students who join the program make a commitment to take action on at least one local and one global initiative.

"Students can take action on any issue they care about," said Stillman. "It's their choice."

According to We Day officials, youth involved in We Act since 2007 have raised $45 million for 1,000 causes. They have also volunteered 14.8 million hours for local and global initiatives, and have collected and donated 5.6 million pounds of food. According to Stillman, roughly 445 Minnesota schools are active in We Act. In 2013, more than 180 Minnesota schools participated in Free The Children's We Scare Hunger campaign, collecting 161,200 pounds of food for local food shelves.

"One of the reasons we brought We Day to Minnesota is because of its long history with philanthropy," said Stillman. "It's built into the culture. Minnesotans are a giving people."

Today's star-studded event in St. Paul will include numerous speakers and performers, including NBA legend and hall of famer Magic Johnson, social advocate, filmmaker and grandson of Nelson Mandela Kwekur Mandela, as well as Lt. Colonel Eileen Collins, a retired NASA astronaut and first female space shuttle commander.

Kielburger, who travels 300 days a year for his work with Free The Children, said he hopes We Day Minnesota inspires the next generation of philanthropists. "I hope students come away feeling energized and emboldened that they can better the world," he said. "That's because they can."

For more information about Free The Children, see www.freethechildren.com.