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Around the Tubes - Non-College Youth, Institutional Change, and the Wall St. Journal

A few quick hits this morning:

Voting GapNPR takes a closer look at non-college young voters and posits that they are being "left behind" in the surge of participation we've seen this year. What was most interesting to me about this story was that they include college graduates/young professionals in the category of "non-college." I always assume that the term applies strictly to young people lacking a college degree and not currently attending university. It's weird because the graphic on the right seems to support my interpretation, but the article itself is quite unclear.

Peter Levine, the Director of CIRCLE, has an interesting post on his blog outlining the many levers of power in our democracy (non profits, voting, the arts, academia, etc.) and analyzing the pros and cons of using each to accomplish major change. I think he is slightly off when looking at the "cons" of blogging and the arts - there is ample evidence of blogs leading to offline action (see Donna Edwards' win just a few weeks ago), and the arts can be more influential than he thinks. But of course I'm biased. I wish the chart Levine constructed was an image - it would be a good thing to post around as a conversation starter, and it's certainly something all activists should at least look at and think about.

The Wall Street Journal gives props to young voters in a pretty good article in yesterday's paper.

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February 28th, 2008 1:27pm
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Arts

Submitted by Josh Koenig on Thu, 2008-02-28 14:50.

I think in his chart he really means The Arts (aka the fine arts), as opposed to the various artifacts and forces which shape culture.

High School Progressives

Submitted by blueflame on Fri, 2008-02-29 05:26.

I'm glad to see that this is being brought up, because it immediately raises a few important questions: Are we overlooking potential voters by strictly focusing on college students? Could it be worthwhile to target young people before they're 18? How can progressives reach out to young people who don't make it into college?

I think the key is to start younger. When college freshman arrive on campus at any major university in America they are immediately hit with a barrage of opportunities to join incredible progressive organizations. College Dems, YDA, Campus Progress, The ONE Campaign, DFA, the PIRGs, and the Roosevelt Institution are just a few of the many progressive groups active on college campuses nationally. The problem is that there really are no active national progressive organizations at the high school level. Of course there's YDA, which is for anyone under 36, but they only have a few high school chapters and don't hold high school specific conventions.

The only effective national high school political organization (that I know of) is the Junior State of America. The problem with JSA (I can say this having been a chapter president for two years) is that, due to it's strictly non-partisan focus, all activities take place within the "JSA bubble." There are engaging debates that help build public speaking skills, exciting mock elections for internal positions, and various educational aspects, but besides building political awareness, none of this has any impact on the real world.

What we need is a powerful well-structured national progressive high school organization. There would be substantial challenges to forming an organization like this - for example, many high schools ban or restrict any kind of political actives at school (including voter registration!) - but I think it's absolutely necessary to start reaching out to younger activists if we want to truly build a progressive majority in America for the long-term.

I plan on speaking on this topic in greater detail at the DC Rootscamp in April. Please contact me with any ideas, questions, or comments: ian [at] gotdemocracy.com

Great point

Submitted by Michael Connery on Fri, 2008-02-29 13:35.

This is a great point. There's really three strands here.

1 - campaigns. The Obama campaign has made a point to reach out to High School students. That was part of the reason for their great succes in the Iowa caucus. So first and foremost, it would be great to get state and local campaigns to understand that high schoolers can be organizers for them and valuable votes.

2 - partisan, institutional outreach: like you mention, efforts by YDA, the DNC, state parties: partisan democratic institutions that can reach out to young people in high school with a high degree of interest in politics. I think YDA is working on this - particulary in "Red" and rural areas, but I could be wrong. This sounds most like what you are talking about.

3 - cultural, soft outreach: This is what was great about things like Music for America, which worked at all ages shows and on summer tours. That's where you are going to find people who aren't necessarily highly partisan, ideological or engaged. Making a culturally relevant contact with those people "primes the pump" to get them more involved as they get older.

Roots Camp

Submitted by Michael Connery on Fri, 2008-02-29 13:35.

Oh, and I will be at Roots Camp. Looking forward to meeting and hearing your pitch on this.

M