Samantha Smith Challenge

Opportunity for middle and high school

The Samantha Smith Challenge 2022-2023 (SSC) is now available on the Americans Who Tell the Truth (AWTT) website (www.americanswhotellthetruth.org). As always, AWTT offers this challenge as an opportunity for middle and high school students to use the creative arts to build a bridge between the classroom and the world as they seek truth, share hope, examine and act upon issues critical to the common good.

In the words of a former SSC participant,

“Hope is power, power is hope. The Samantha Smith Challenge helped me feel powerful and hopeful.” 

We believe that engaged and passionate students learn more. As AWTT looks at the past year and the months ahead, we recognize more than ever the importance of seeking truth and sharing a message of hope, just as Samantha Smith did forty years ago.

This year SSC students will begin by examining what it means to be a Truth Teller, identify important community and world issues, understand them, and make a compelling argument in an effective and creative medium to move people to work for the common good. This year’s SSC is about the importance of truth and sharing ways to be hopeful about the future.

AWTT portrait subjects seek truth and find creative responses to challenges. Their courage and engagement give us hope.  Check out Mary Bonauto, Steven Donziger, Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, Kelsey Juliana, Bill McKibben, Stephen Ritz, and Dawn Wooten to see how a quest for truth grounded in hope fuels work for the common good. 

As in past years, the directions for participating in the SSC are on the AWTT website. (www.americanswhotellthetruth.org/programs/education/samantha-smith-challenge/) 

Rob Shetterly, artist and AWTT founder

If you have questions, please contact Education Director Connie Carter at connieamericanswhotellthetruth.org. You may sign up between December 1 and February 1. This year’s SSC is expanding beyond Maine. As AWTT navigates that expansion they hope to connect schools across real and perceived boundaries to share their work for the common good. AWTT founder and artist Robert Shetterly and Connie will also be available to support students on their creative journeys of truth seeking. 

The SSC Celebration will be on Wednesday, May 24, 2023 — a time to celebrate and share the creative journeys for truth and messages of hope from all participating students. Please contact Connie at connie@americanswhotellthetruth.org if you have questions or concerns. AWTT looks forward to working with you and your students on this year’s SSC.