MyGovernment.org

MyGovernment.org

A stellar team of internet and education leaders recently asked CivicActions to provide strategy, development, and design for MyGovernment.org, an online "town hall forum" that activates the average citizen to engage with their own government leaders.

MyGovernment.org is designed from the citizen’s perspective – providing a portal into civic engagement. Tools and resources allow the citizen to reach all levels of government and advocate for their personal causes. The visual design and information architecture of the site emphasize the citizen's needs, focusing on how public policy affects their daily life, and providing them with access to elected officials relevant to a particular issues.

Featuring user-generated content, the site is a "Wikipedia for policy options." It serves as a vital teaching tool and resource, informing debate and decision-making by leveraging citizen expertise. The content on MyGovernment.org is currently being edited and managed by students in a national network of campuses. In alignment with CivicActions' core values, MyGovernment.org provides a platform for making leaders and government more transparent and accountable, and encourages a dynamic relationship between citizens and their elected leaders.

The leaders of MyGovernment.org are Andrew Shue (co-founder CafeMom.com and Do Something), Robert Hackett  (founder, PolicyOptions.org & VP, Bonner Foundation), John Palfrey (director, Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society),  Jimmy Wales (co-founder, Wikipedia), and Henry Poole (co-founder, CivicActions).

About PolicyOptions.org Initiative

The Policy Options Initiative seeks to establish a network of local community think tanks that will make policy information, news, and research available on websites, weekly email news updates, and research. These community think tanks will feature local, state, and national policy news and analysis on topics of local interest that draw upon policies and program models from around the country and world.  

The goal of the PolicyOptions.org is to fill an important gap in our public life: the availability of accurate, balanced, comprehensive information and analysis about the issues that we care about and hope to impact through public policy and civic engagement. We believe that this information is critical to informed citizen action in shaping policy and planning program improvements.

They will tap the underutilized research capacity of institutions of higher education to create local and state level community think tanks, which will be housed in participating college or university public policy or community outreach centers or institutes. These locally-focused bureaus will be linked through an affiliate structure to cover state issues and to a central national office that will cover national and international policy and program activity.

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