civic engagement

Last week during the Teen Choice Awards, DoSomething.Org honored a young community activist (under the age of 25) that aims to change the world. The winner received $100,000 to continue the community project started prior to the award. Finalists were posted on the Teen Choice website and fans voted for their favorite.

"One amazing young person is going to be recognized for their philanthropic efforts and impact on their community and get the rock star treatment they deserve at the show," said Bob Bain, Executive Producer of TEEN CHOICE 2008.

Do Something is a non-partisan non-profit that believes teenagers have the power to make a difference. They leverage communications technologies to enable teens to convert their ideas and energy into positive action. Their site says "We inspire, empower and celebrate a generation of doers."

"We think young people aren’t just tomorrow’s leaders; many young people are doing amazing things right now," said Nancy Lublin, CEO of Do Something, Inc.

And the Winner is.....

The winner this year winner was 19 year old Chad Bullock who has become the leading youth anti-tobacco activist…and he lives right in the middle of tobacco country. He works with politicians, companies, not for profits and other teens. One of his biggest successes was making the Durham Bulls Arena a smoke-free arena.

This is a unique way for an organization as well as a nationally televised event to convey to young people the impact they can have on the world around them. Young people already volunteer in their communities in encouraging numbers according to CIRCLE.

"44% believe that "people working together" can make a great deal of difference in solving local problems" and "45% believe they can make some difference" by volunteering in their community.

Honoring them and encouraging others to also get involved can continue the civic engagement we now see from the Millennial Generation.

Bumped. --Mike

A little over two weeks ago at my blog, I posted about McCain's use of the Internet -- or lack thereof. Here's a reminder of remarks McCain made in a New York Times interview.

Q: But do you go on line for yourself?

Mr. McCain: They go on for me. I am learning to get online myself, and I will have that down fairly soon, getting on myself. I don’t expect to be a great communicator, I don’t expect to set up my own blog, but I am becoming computer literate to the point where I can get the information that I need – including going to my daughter’s blog first, before anything else.

Q: Do you use a blackberry or email?

Mr. McCain: No

We now have more information regarding McCain's training program. He's now moved, albeit imperceptibly, forward in his quest toward mastering the internet and becoming, uh, modern. These are remarks he made to the San Francisco Chronicle.

GOP presidential candidate John McCain, fundraising in the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the nation's technology capitals, acknowledged Monday that he isn't a "tech freak" or entirely comfortable with the Internet, BlackBerrys or e-mail. But he strongly disputed criticism that he is "out of the loop" as unfair.

As former head of the U.S. Senate Commerce committee, McCain said, he has been a driving force to oversee legislation that helped the Internet flourish - even as he is still learning to get comfortable with it himself.

"Am I a tech freak? No," he said in an interview Monday with The Chronicle. "And I don't like to text message because I'd rather call somebody on the telephone."

"I do understand the importance of the computer. I understand the importance of the blogs," he said.

McCain said he is well aware that technology "does drive the news. It is changing the shape of the news. ... It's changing the information age, and I've got to stay up with it."

He added, "But I am forcing myself ... let me put it this way, I am using the computer more and more every day."

Well, that's great. So anyone that happens to be very comfortable with email is a "tech freak." And anyone that likes to text message is antisocial. At this rate, John McCain just might be ready to use a PC when everyone leaves for Mars.

Anyway -- why is this a big deal? Two reasons.

1.) The Internet is our technological infrastructure. And as an American, I want someone in the White House who is comfortable using this vital resource that will continue to be even more in our lives with each passing day and year. If we have someone leading us who is merely "staying up with it," what are the odds that person is going to put the Internet and technological development as a budget priority, no matter what they say in interviews with newspapers in the middle of a political campaign? Not good. I want someone that doesn't have to "force [himself]" to use the Internet, someone that understands its inherent value.

2.) Check this out:

When our next president takes over, as you can see, he will be in charge of leading one of the most civically engaged generations in this country's history whose engagement is mostly due to the Internet. Whether people like it or not, the Internet is a central piece of this new style of activism. Georgia10 at Daily Kos wrote a diary a few weeks back amid the controversy about whether or not this generation should be using the Internet as a form of activism. Georgia10 explained very patiently that the Internet and civic engagement for Millennials are linked -- they are one and the same. She used a study released by the Institute for Politics, Democracy, and the Internet to illustrate this link.

According to some observers, the Internet may have considerable potential to reach and engage opinion leaders who influence the thinking and behavior of others. According to the Institute for Politics, Democracy & the Internet, "Online Political Citizens" (OPCs) are "seven times more likely than average citizens to serve as opinion leaders among their friends, relatives and colleagues...Normally, 10% of Americans qualify as Influentials. Our study found that 69% of Online Political Citizens are Influentials.

By electing a president who has no clue about what the Internet is, what its potential is, and its impact thus far on heightened civic engagement among the youngest Americans, we are actually undercutting one of the lone reasons for optimism in this country. We're still mired in the Iraq War, we're ignoring a War on Terror, and the economy is still slumping (about which McCain knows little as well). But we can use what's going well for us. Right now, our youth's increasing civic engagement is going well; but the Internet is a vital piece of that. Far too vital, in fact, to elect a president that will merely "stay up with it."

There are few Justices out there that are as hip as Sandra D. Seems the good x-Justice has been spending her time working on video games.

NYTimes reports that Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has gone from her post on the US Supreme Court to working to develop video games that create real life scenarios for students to learn the law and create interest in ways to change laws.

"If you imagine what Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor is doing in her retirement, you might not come up with this: designing provocative clothing for virtual avatars to wear in a multi-player online game.

But potentially offensive T-shirts, and the First Amendment issues they may raise, are in fact a key part of the computer game that the retired justice is helping design as part of an elaborate civics education program she is sponsoring.

The first section of the game is about a First Amendment issue like a t-shirt that a kid wears to school. This is similar to the real life case of the kid who made a sign that said "bong hits 4 Jesus" for a local school rally.

"Justice O’Connor didn’t describe the actual game play, but she said it will involve players taking different roles in a court argument.

“We will have them arguing real cases, real issues, against the computer and against each other,” she said. “We will use what we know about young people’s enthusiasm for arguing things, for problem-solving and for playing games to get them into this world.”

Later, Justice O’Connor would like to add a case about the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. And down the road, she said she hopes to create similar simulations for the legislative and executive branches of government."

I really respect what the Justice is doing and truly admire the attempts at doing these kinds of educational materials. I worry, however, that this only educates and doesn't necessarily promote the idea of civic engagement.

When you look at the middle school level, I don't know if kids are going to make the link between the way the law is and their power to change what they don't like. We have a hard enough time making that connection for adults and college students who are new registrants.

I would have to see the game or the lesson plan to really understand more about how they are making that link but I'm encouraged and hopeful though admittedly cautious as well. Regardless, its a pretty smokin Justice if she's making video games. That's pretty cool.

There's an important story in the New York Times today about student voting rights. Down in Prairie View Texas, two voting rights cases are underway. The first involves the use of voter fraud charges by the Attorney General to intimidate black and hispanic (Democratic) voters in the country. Recent reports indicate that of 26 voter fraud cases brought by the Attorney General, all were against Democrats and almost all were against black or hispanic voters.

The second involves hundreds of students who were denied their right to vote in 2006:

Before the 2006 election, Judge Charleston said in an interview, he personally registered about 1,000 students. But on Election Day, he said, hundreds of them were turned away as not registered to vote. The registration cards were later found in county offices, he said.

Ellen C. Shelburne, the county tax assessor and registrar, who took office in January 2007, said she had recently been questioned by investigators from Mr. Abbott’s office and had told them that she knew nothing about the matter. Jerry Strickland, a spokesman for Mr. Abbott, said, “We cannot comment on ongoing investigations.”

Waller County has a long history of voter suppression, but we don't have to go back all that far to know that this will be important in November. During the primaries, Waller County purposefully tried to discourage student voting by locating early voting locations far from campus at the county seat. Students protested that decision at the time and marched over 7 miles to cast their ballots:

I expect tactics like this will become common in many places this November, particularly after the Supreme Court issued its ruling on the Indiana voter ID law. Student voter suppression happens every year. It occurred in 2004, it occurred in 2006, and those were elections cycles in which most of the political class did not think the youth vote would matter.

This year, the youth vote could be up to 25% of the electorate and will likely vote around 66 - 33 Democratic. Does anyone have doubts that the Republicans will do all they can to suppress that vote?

Matthew Segal is the founding executive director of the Student Association for Voter Empowerment (SAVE) and the National Challenge Coordinator for the Roosevelt Institution--the nation's first student think-tank. He can be reached at Matthew.Segal@savevoting.org.

Two weeks ago, September 25th, the United States Supreme Court agreed to consider a case on voter ID laws. The case, appealed in the seventh circuit court, requires registered voters in the state of Indiana to provide a government-issued photo ID in order to cast a ballot. Proponents of the law will tell you that photo IDs are necessary to combat voter fraud, which is pervasive and insidious. They will readily speak about "illegal immigrants" who are inundating our polling places and casting illegitimate votes without providing any identification. They will also just say that there is no good reason why someone should not have photo identification; after all, you need one to drive a car, fly on an airplane, cash a check, or even to rent a movie.

What proponents of the bill will not tell you is that, shocking as it may seem, not all Americans drive cars, fly on planes, or even go to Blockbuster. The actual evidence of this "rampant" voter fraud is minimal. Arizona, where voter ID laws were implemented in November of 2006, has 2.7 million registered voters, "238 [of whom] were believed to have been non-citizens in the last 10 years" according to Joyce Purnick in a Sept. 26, 2006 article in the New York Times. On top of this, any undocumented immigrant who is foolish enough to try to vote illegally will likely receive incarceration if not deportation for such actions—risks that are clearly not worth the reward.

In its attempt to cordon the throng of illegal immigrant phantom voters, voter ID laws sacrifice the poor, the elderly, the young, and many minorities as collateral damage. The bill is tantamount to a modern day "poll-tax," that forces many eligible voters to pay for a government-issued photo ID. Furthermore, proof of citizenship often comes in the form of a birth certificate, another document unobtainable or even nonexistent for many people born outside of hospitals. Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan estimates that in her state alone, some 200,000 eligible voters do not possess driver's licenses or any similar forms of photo identification. Many senior citizens have let their driver's licenses expire and many young people have not yet applied for them, while poor citizens often cannot afford to drive cars or purchase state approved IDs and passports.

Requiring photo IDs also increases confusion for election administrators. In a hearing held by the Student Association for Voter Empowerment (SAVE) this past July, several college students testified about the inability to prove domicile in their college districts merely because their photo ID was from a different part of the state or another state entirely. Photo ID laws can therefore prevent out-of-state college students from registering in the district where they attend school. Were this the case ubiquitously, nearly all young voters would be forced to vote absentee, making the registration process more bureaucratic, time-consuming, and cumbersome.

In a post that appeared earlier this week, Mike Connery recommended an article titled "Generation Why” by Liz Brown, the daughter of Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH). At the start of the article, Liz quotes a student named Andrew Lyubarsky who states, “The election of 2000 is definitely what politicized me, caused me to think critically about the American system.” His remark, a not-so-surprising statement, triggered a larger reflection: What are the ways that young people today are being politicized?

By politicization I mean simply: “to give a political character to.” I’m using it in a very broad and positive sense, as in the catalyzing of active citizenship and the formation of critical consciousness in a democratic society. What activates young Americans? What calls them to action and causes them to think critically about politics and society?

The following list is in no way an attempt at being comprehensive. These are only initial thoughts that I am offering as a simple reflection and for further conversation.