Editor’s note: The following is the personal experience of the reporter, who participated in a Darfur rally in Washington, D.C.

After a 16-hour drive from Champaign to Evanston, Ill., to Washington D.C., a group of about 25 University students and 80 Northwestern University students arrived in front of the nation’s capital building.

With the group Action Darfur, a University Registered Student Organization that is a chapter of the broader umbrella organization, Students Taking Action Now: Darfur, or STAND, we lobbied with hundreds of high school and college students and rallied with thousands of citizens of the world to save Darfur and its people from the cruelty of home invasion, village burnings, rape and injustice that have been part of the three-year-long genocide in the western part of Sudan in Africa.

On Friday afternoon, we split up to lobby for three requests: getting the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to help protect Darfurians with the implementation of a no-fly zone, ensuring the allocation for the immediate funding of $173 million to help aid refugees of Darfur, and allocating $700 million next year to build a robust force and provide more resources.

We visited the offices of Rep. Tim Johnson (R-Ill.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and met with a member of each of their staffs.

In Johnson’s office, Jodi Farritor, graduate student; Stephanie Magid, sophomore in FAA; and Brian Schwartz, senior in LAS, told a staff member that we were part of a student-run organization and that as residents of the State of Illinois, we would like Johnson to vote on any follow-up bills and to help enforce the Darfur Peace and Accountability Act.

Both staff members thanked us for visiting and said they were proud to hear from such passionate and caring student activists. They said they would pass along our requests and messages of support to stop genocide to their bosses. Although it seemed the staff members were happy to meet with us, we felt some disappointment because we did not meet with the statesmen.

On Saturday, we attended an activist training session. Georgetown and George Washington University students who are part of STAND welcomed us. Samantha Power, an activist and Pulitzer Prize winner for her book “A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide,” warmly greeted before the session started. The workshop focused on three key points: recruit, meet and take action.

On Sunday, our last day, Sudanese refugees, students, religious and political leaders, and Hollywood celebrities came together to rally on the Mall, the area south of the capital building. We were entertained by musicals acts such as River Nile. We were comforted by rabbis and ministers. We were in awe of the strong presence and height of seven-foot-seven-inch Sudanese Manute Bol, who used to play in the NBA. We jumped with admiration when Obama came on stage to tell us that we have the power to stop genocide.

With the theme and shouts of “Never Again,” which referenced the empty promises of previous presidential administrations to stop genocide around the world, people came together this weekend to secure humanity throughout the world. We were told to not be a silent movement.

Even though we missed George Clooney’s speech because we had to make the 16-hour bus ride back to campus to give presentations, study and take finals, with the historical monuments and political activity surrounding us, we were motivated by the speeches and masses of people present. But more importantly, we were inspired by the Sudanese natives in D.C. to keep on fighting to end genocide and instill peace.