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.e Hampton Youth Commission was born.4e Hampton Youth Commission comprises twenty-fouryouth commissioners, young people of high school age whoare selected by youth and adult commission members andare charged with representing their peers in the city decision-making process.ese youth commissioners have, as theyput it, four  power plays : policy, programs, partnerships,and philanthropy.With the youth planners, they set policyby owning a piece of Hampton s Community Plan, a com-prehensive planning document that sets short- and long-termpriorities for the city.ey recommend and start new pro-grams, from neighborhood service and diversity promotionto youth-friendly spaces.ey form partnerships with orga-nizations throughout the city.ey even have a small pot ofmoney ($40,000) that they can give away each year to supportlocal efforts of their peers.Hampton is only one city, of course, with a population ofonly 150,000 people.But its model demonstrates the powerwho s afraid of virginia youth? 177of youth engagement not only to affect the quality of the livesof the young people involved but also to improve the com-munity.Everyone I interviewed during my visit affirmed howdifferent Hampton is since these efforts to engage young peo-ple began.People from across the country come to learn fromHampton, and for good reason.All of our communities canbenefit from the engagement of our young citizens.And allyoung citizens would benefit from this firsthand opportuni-ty to make a difference.e Community Plan is an important vehicle for the youthplanners. One of their goals is that young people would beprepared for a career, Carlson told me. So they have playedaround with some ideas about working with the school divi-sion on what s required, what s available to young people inthe area of careers outside of the career and technical edu-cation program. e youth commissioners have worked oncell phone policy, requirements for participation in extracur-ricular activities and sports, and the school calendar.eirschools are not only the place where they learn the threeRs but also the setting for their experience in democraticparticipation.Although many of today s young people see governmentinstitutions as remote and inaccessible, Hampton s youthactively engage in them.e Hampton Youth Commissionorganizes mock city council and mayoral elections to coin-cide with citywide elections. It s like a game show, explained Troy, a youth commis-sioner. We ask [the candidates] questions that youth wantto know the answer to and see who is youth friendly and whowould be good to work with the Hampton Youth Commis-sion, because we do work with the city council.We actual-ly have a mock election  and for the past three times we vedone it, it came out to how the actual election came out.It sconsidered a good omen of who is going to win.ey actual-ly take it very seriously and so do we.Every two years we do178 politics: engaged or connected?it, and this past year it was pretty successful.A lot of youthcame out  we had a full house and actually had to put moreseats out.e adults have to sit in the back and are not allowed tosay a word.e Youth Commission screens the questions.Troy said the bottom line about whether a question getsasked is if the city council has something to do with it. Some-one may have a question about the schools, but the city coun-cil doesn t have anything to do with schools, so that questionis a no go. It s a really good way to get students interested in poli-tics and involved locally.If you re over eighteen you can reg-ister to vote.It s a good way to get young people interestedin voting, Troy said of the forums.Maybe that s one reasonthat the turnout of young Hampton voters in the 2004 elec-tions was 29 percent higher than the national average.5Like the students at the School for Democracy and Lead-ership, Hampton s youth are learning that involvement inlocal politics not only improves their community but alsogives them a sense of agency, which comes from seeing howtheir engagement can directly change public policy.ey aremore confident in themselves and more confident about theirrole and responsibilities in their democracy.ere is noth-ing abstract about their involvement; they are like the kids atthe Exploratorium, digging their hands into local issues andinstitutions.ey have power, and with it they are makingsure that they ask the right questions. Cause and Effecte political activity of the students of Hampton may seempositively antiquated when compared with how we thinkabout the political activity of young people today.Much hasbeen said and written about the millennials savvy in creatingwho s afraid of virginia youth? 179and taking advantage of online social networks to work forsocial and political change, particularly during the 2008 elec-tion.Yes, young people went door to door to turn out votersto the polls, but impressive levels of activity also took placeonline.For example, on Election Day 2008, the Causes fea-ture of the Facebook Web site allowed users to  donate theirstatus  the part of a user s profile that informs other usersabout what one is doing  to encourage voting.is didn tinvolve a monetary donation, just a decision to replace what-ever update the user would normally have made with a mes-sage reminding others to vote.As of 3:30 p.m.on November4, 1.6 million people had donated their status and a total of4.7 million status messages had been posted.Millions of peo-ple couldn t help but be reminded to vote.6Today s young people are the first generation to have attheir fingertips such incredible technology for political orga-nizing.ey also are the first generation that has so deliber-ately linked their consumption to their activism, using thepower of their purse to pursue change.In Social Citizens Beta, a thoughtful report for the CaseFoundation, Allison Fine examines the activism of the mil-lennials.She draws a portrait of a generation that is  fas-cinating and important for what they are growing up with(digital technology); how they work (collaboratively); whatthey believe (that they can make the world a better place tolive); and how they are living their lives (green, connected,passionately, idealistically). 7 She describes a generation thatis committed to social change but is expressing it in uniqueways, taking advantage of communications technology toshare information and organize, and notes their value as ahighly sought-a er demographic group in the marketplace.e report, based on reviews of the research and inter-views across the country, is helpful to understanding the gen-eration.And although Fine, like many others who write aboutthe millennial generation, is clearly enchanted with them, the180 politics: engaged or connected?report asks tough questions about the depth of their involve-ment even as it praises their savvy.While examining youngpeople s motivations for activism, however, Fine identifieswhat I see as an unhelpful dichotomy that has lasting impli-cations for the engagement of young people in questioningtheir democracy:  By and large, millennials are not interest-ed in or focused on the creation of new government policiesas solutions for the issues they care about.ey are focusedprimarily on taking action and seeing results [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]