Staying in touch with your congressional representative is crucial if you want your voice heard and your views to be known. Finding ways to get a hold of your representative can be tricky because of their busy schedules and all of the other people who want to discuss matters with them. At NCART, we wanted to share some simple ways that you can take part in the debate with your member of Congress and make a change! Resistbot By using this technology, your texts are turned into faxes to your representative by the service. Overtime, you'll unlock more uses of Resistbot to become a more influential advocate. Email Email is the fastest, most popular way to get in touch, but so many people use this platform that it is important to make your views stand out by being innovative, factual, and to the point. You can also look online for forms that your member of Congress may provide for you to send a message to them. Countable This service seeks to give you a greater voice in politics. Countable gives you a simple and short overview of the bills your representatives are debating. Then it lets you send emails to them describing how you feel about the issue and how they should vote. ThinkUp This tool is used as a way to gauge popular sentiment through social media. ThinkUp shows social media analytics so government officials can learn more about their followers. By liking your representative's social media posts over certain topics, they will be able to go in and see what is most popular so your voice is heard. Advocacy Groups Apart from spending money to lobby, many advocacy groups have created networks in order to have connections with members of Congress. Advocacy groups do research over main pieces of legislation and know who is on which committees. By knowing this, they will be able to organize meetings, phone trees, and small campaigns, so if you stay involved with a group, you will have more immediate access to your Congress person. By using these diverse tools and strategies, you will be able to successfully get your views across when contacting your Congress person. At NCART, we believe these different tactics can help you can make the difference you've been wanting!