YEO

Some quick hits for you as we head into the weekend (or, perhaps, just the end).

• A Washington Post piece asks if college is worth it
• Ezra Klein flags a graphic showing the percentage of recent college grads with jobs, by major.
  

  

• Speaking of college, here are ten reasons to get pumped for life following graduation.
• Nebraska's 4H organization and the YMCA team up to offer youth entrepreneur classes. An interesting partnership and initiative.
• CBS writes up the story we covered yesterday regarding Rockefeller's belief that young people are morally hollow. (Apparently 13 more people like him on Facebook between yesterday and today.)
• New Hampshire is aging.
• The Pope knows what's up--at least regarding the wisdom of listening to young people.
• Two young candidates in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania area won primaries this week.
• Young Canadian city council candidate links young people to the local community.
• UK developing youth "underclass"
• The government: Just say no to sexting.
• Young people afraid to call themselves feminists.
• When will the GOP realize they are on the wrong side of history?

You've read about this movement before here.

And now, it's taken another step forward.

After a failed student campaign a year ago, William and Mary students put together an organization called Students for a Better Williamsburg (SBW), an organization engaging local government in order to provide the best outcomes for students. This effort led to the amendment of a housing ordinance, making it more student friendly and eliminating an issue that divided the town and gown factions in the community for years.

This past spring, a student ran for a Williamsburg city council seat once more. Last Tuesday night, Scott Foster, a graduating senior, dominated the contest.

Foster was elected to the Williamsburg City Council on Tuesday night, becoming the first William & Mary student ever to do so. The 22-year-old said his win was a victory for town and gown relationships.

"Today, the people of Williamsburg demonstrated that our city is truly unified," Foster said Tuesday night. "When I decided to run for City Council, I hoped to receive the student vote. Now, I have been additionally honored and humbled to have received such strong support from across our City."

Foster received 1559 votes in the election, 741 more votes than the next finisher, Planning Commission Chairman Doug Pons, who also earned a seat on the council Tuesday night. Five candidates, including one incumbent, ran for the two open positions. According to Foster's campaign, approximately 67 percent of his votes came from students and the remaining votes came from residents.

Over 1000 William and Mary students voted for their fellow student in the election, ensuring that college students will have a strong voice in the city's government. Between this victory and the aforementioned organization of Students for a Better Williamsburg, William and Mary students have provided students across the country with a model for organizing within the system to produce positive outcomes.

How did Foster do it? Well, in textbook Millennial fashion. Foster used online social networking to spread the news, and then benefited from a student-coordinated voter registration and GOTV effort on William and Mary's campus.

Foster benefited from a coordinated get-out-the-vote campaign by William & Mary students. Earlier this year, student organizations, including the Student Assembly, worked to encourage students to vote in the election through a series of registration efforts. Approximately 300 students registered this year as a result of the drive. More than 2,100 students are registered to vote in the City of Williamsburg and early estimates indicate that roughly 50 percent of registered students voted in Tuesday's election.

On election day, the Student Assembly provided transportation for students between the Sadler Center and the Stryker Building voting location. Sarah Rojas ‘10, outgoing president of the assembly, also sent an e-mail to the College's students, encouraging them to vote in the election.

[...]

Much of Foster's campaign was run by students who utilized a website and social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube. Foster also spent a good deal of time meeting city residents.

After his upcoming graduation, Foster plans to continue his studies at William and Mary in 2011, attending the William and Mary Law School.

As we've been blogging progressive youth politics, it seems that we've heard more stories about young candidates running for mayoral and city council seats across the country. Chalk up another, but this time it's for a New York City Council seat.

Dodge Landesman, an eighteen year old Democrat running in a primary election for the Second District seat on New York's City Council, labels himself as "pro-growth" and "anti-bailout." Landesman's campaign seems to take a page or two from President Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, as Landesman continually calls for a "participatory campaign" in which constituents mold his positions on various issues and other youth get involved in politics, specifically local politics. Landesman's three big issues are education, marriage equality, and community service. Landesman calls for a more efficient education system, in which "good teachers" are rewarded, noting that education is an issue that has largely fallen off City Council's priority list. Landesman promises to propose legislation in New York City that allows everyone the right to marry should he be elected. Finally, Landesman plans to offer tax cuts to those volunteering in their communities, hoping to foster a generational culture of service within the city.

Landesman's campaign has reached out to Facebook, creating a group called "Dodge Landesman for City Council in 2009." Dodge is also on Twitter; he can be followed @Dodge_Landesman. The Landesman campaign is working on developing a full website, but in the meantime, a temporary one has been constructed at http://www.dodgeforcitycouncil.org.

Landesman's opponent is City Councilmember Rosie Mendez. Her official page on the city council site can be viewed here.

Kudos to Dodge for getting things off the ground. We'll be checking in down the road to see how the campaign is going.

• If you're following the special election in NY - 20, you know it's a squeaker. As it sits now, Republican Jim Tedisco leads Democrat Scott Murphy by just 12 votes. So it's particularly troubling to learn about voting problems for students at Skidmore College.
• Moreley Winograd and Mike Hais are educating Politico readers about the Millennial Generation's political influence.
• Very cool Boston.com article about a teenager who is using tech to upgrade the local transit system.
• Congrats to the Bus Project on their success at The Pollies.
• Over at The League, their new website 99 Problems is getting some good press.
• In her column for the Daily Beast, Megan McCain sees the future of the GOP in young Congressman Aaron Schock.
• Want to make your campus green? Check out the America's Greenest Campus competition. The school that recruits the most members will win $5000 for sustainable projects. The school that most reduces its carbon footprint per capita will win $10,000. You can also find some good coverage of the contest's social media aspects here at Mashable!.
• Yesterday Congress passed the GIVE Act. For a good rundown on the significance of this legislation, check out Peter Levine's blog.

I'm still decompressing from my wedding/honeymoon and getting my house (figurative and literal) in order. It will probably take me a couple days to fully get back in to the swing of things after two weeks off the grid. In the meantime, here' a Quick Hits(ish) post. Expect a lot of these for the next couple of days as I get back on my feet.

• Here's an interesting chart delineating the proper uses of twitter in a variety of business/activist settings. Colin Delaney of ePolitics also has some interesting things to say about the proper uses of Twitter.

• Erica Williams deftly explains the power of good messaging in a policy fight.
• At Mother Jones, Michael Silberman offers yet another look at how online tools helped put Obama over the top.
• 5 elements of a successful Facebook fan page.
• Front Line Leaders Academy, a project of PFAW and the Young Elected Officials Network, is accepting applications for their 2009 class.
• Secretary Clinton has announced plans for a second Alliance of Youth Movements Summit. The goals of the summit are to help youth use online tools to fight oppression, and win over hearts and minds around the world.
• CIRCLE has released a slide show of data about non-college youth:

• Open Left and Daily Kos' microgrants program is up and running. Go read the rules and submit your idea.
• For those looking for summer opportunities in politics, check out the New Organizing Institute's Summer Boot Camp.

Tonight, at 7pm PACIFIC, 10pm eastern, we're going to have our first live-blogging session in at least 3 or 4 months. Our guest will be Emanuel Pleitez, a 26 year-old candidate who is vying to win the seat left vacant by Hilda Solis.

More event details here on Facebook. We hope you'll drop by and/or spread the word.

I hope you're enjoying your Saturday evening. Here is some reading...

• Neil Howe (of Millennials Rising fame) and Reena Nadler co-authored a mammoth report that has just been released by the New America Foundation as a part of its Next Social Contract Initiative. The report's title is "'Yes We Can': The Emergence of Millennials as a Political Generation."
• Marc Ambinder ponders the success of Organizing for America's first set of meetings.
• Matt Cooper sizes up Obama's week over at TPMDC.
• Ron Brownstein praises Millennials' practicality.
• To arm or not to arm? That's the question on many college campuses. Campus Politico has the story.
• Bloggers have rights too. The Electronic Frontier Foundation tries to simplify them here.
• Detroit's mayoral candidate, Freman Hendrix, is targeting the youth vote via technology. Kudos to him.
• Jesse Arreguin was the first Latino and youngest person ever to be elected to Berkeley's City Council. Youth Outlook interviews him to find out how he seeks to catalyze positive change.

Update: AdamGreen of the PCCC offers an explanation of the organization over at Open Left.

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A group of former MoveOn.org and labor organizers is rolling out a new cog in progressive infrastructure -- the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.

The Huffington Post posted this story, which Chris Bowers picked up at Open Left on Thursday:

Rather than focusing on large, independent expenditures, ala the Club for Growth, it seeks to help progressive federal candidates, such as Tom Geoghegan, by providing them with expert staff, advice, strategy and connection to the netroots. The focus will be on open seat primaries, and progressives who face competitive general elections, but primaries against conservative Democrats might also come into play. From a Huffington Post story today:

A group of progressive operatives from MoveOn and labor circles have teamed with a prominent Internet pioneer to try to give the Sam Bennetts of the world the final push they need -- and send even more Perriellos to Congress. The organization will be the first of its kind exclusively to focus on electing progressive Democrats in congressional elections.
It won't focus its energy on unseating conservative Democrats, but Green, a cofounder, didn't rule out the possibility. Instead, it will prioritize competitive open-seat primaries and help general election candidates like Bennett and Perriello run effective campaigns.

The group's first forays are likely to be in the Illinois district vacated by Rahm Emanuel, who left to become Obama's chief of staff. Green says the group is in talks with a progressive labor lawyer, Tom Geoghegan, in that district. Another potential target: the California district emptied by Hilda Solis, who's been tapped to be labor secretary.(...)

The PCCC aims to be something of a guiding resource for first-time candidates like Bennett. By helping candidates find good campaign staff and make more effective use of the Internet, the group thinks candidates could save tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in consultant fees. Whereas consultants might charge thousands to record and pump out robo-calls, for instance, the PCCC could show a candidate how to do it in-house, online, for a fraction of the cost.

The PCCC suddenly makes the process of running for office seem much less intimidating for an electoral novice -- a very good thing for many of our potential young elected officials. This organization appears strong, as Bowers notes that it's on track to raise $650,000 this year already. It's also very experienced, thanks to the cadre of former MoveOn.org and labor activists guiding it. For youth toying around with running for office, this is a great tool.

Should this create the positive momentum in attracting young candidates like I think it might, perhaps we can start to fix this problem.

Here are a few more things of interest that have trickled out over the last few days.

Enjoy!

• Via Peter Levine, the Case Foundation has launched "Change Begins with Me," a campaign inviting Americans to go to the organization's website and complete the sentence, "Change begins with me..." The foundation will randomly select one participant who will win a trip to Washington D.C. for the inauguration and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service.
• From the LA Times, a nineteen-year-old Cal State Fullerton student won a Placentia City Council seat. And unlike many of the characters in youth political involvement stories this cycle, Jeremy Yamaguchi is a Republican (though he sounds like a Millennial Republican).
• A reflection on YouTube's political use this cycle -- by a YouTube employee.
• Domestic automobiles aren't appealing to Gen Y.
• Harry C. Boyte's commentary on the civic potential of public works projects, like Obama's.
• A University of Arkansas law student argues that the key to a Democratic breakthrough in the Appalachian region is the development of a "Blue/Green" populist coalition (blue collar workers and green voters), citing examples of success. Possibly a good way to bring Boomers and Millennials together?
• Last summer, Congress passed a bill extending the Higher Education Act of 1965. The Dept. of Education is now charged with executing the bill, and it's proposing regulations on how to do just that.

Happy Holidays. Here's what's caught my eye this week:

• The Washington Independent notes that Obama's energy policy is being driven by (young) green votes.
• AlterNet asks, Will the youth movement save the labor movement?
• Daily Kos has data that Join the Impact's anti-Prop 8 protests have changed enough minds in California that the ballot measure would not pass a second time. And they have data to prove it. That's an effective use of the protest model.
• The National Journal credits young voters with Obama's win, noting that his advantage among Millennials is bad news for the longterm health of the GOP. Generation We, YDA and others get good play in this excellent article.
• Oregon local news notes that young people were elected to the state legislature in droves this year, doubling their numbers within the Democratic caucus. Jefferson Smith, one of the founders of the Bus Project, is one of those new Young Elected Officials and he is quoted in the article.
• Netcentric Advocacy gives us the Obama campaign by the numbers. Interesting stats here.
• This is a must read. In the Huffington Post, Jake Brewer of the Energy Action Coalition, son of a GM worker, gives a heartbreaking and insightful account of the state of the auto industry. Word on the street is that this piece is getting read by GM execs.
• MySpace and Change.org are partnering with a number of other youthy and techie c3s to ask for your ideas on what President Obama should do once he takes office. They've got a cool Digg-style site set up to rate ideas, which must be no more than 250 words in length.
• The Obama Transition Team wants your ideas on healthcare.
• The Daily Kos empire expands with the launch of Congress Matters, a new blog that will track what's going on in Congress and offer activists and regular citizens information on how they can most impact the policy process.
• Danah Boyd and some other smarties have finished a three year ethnographic study of digital youth. This should be interesting.
• Engaged Youth has a post up about the "Activism Style of Millennials."
• At Tech President, Micah Sifry interviews Marshall Ganz about Obama's field operation and the upside and dangers of Obama as the first President backed by a full-fledged movement.