Young, With Heart
State Rep Mark Strama, D-Austin, is back with his biennial Campaign Academy, and this year it's bigger than ever --forty participants. See earlier post.
We stopped by to see what was going on, and to make sure the youngsters weren't secretly making Kathie Lee Gifford brand clothing. (OK, that joke might pre-date the Academy kids.)
Seriously though, the participants not only seemed to be having a lot of fun, they were impressive in the way they came up with ideas and bounced them off of each other and provided social networking expertise to Strama, who admits he doesn't know much about the Facebook world. (I hate the new profile layouts, btw.)
Campaign academy students discuss ways to outreach on Facebook and Myspace.
Strama asks the group for an update on "Stramarama", a fundraiser they have planned for late July.
They are hearing from a diverse bunch of lunch speakers everyday. Today it was former judicial candidate John Lipscombe.
In the afternoon, the group dispersed to go blockwalking. We went with one pair to drop off literature about an East Austin block party. They were pretty fast walkers, especially when you consider we have to run in front of people to get a good shot of them walking and talking.
I asked a lot of the participants why they were spending their summer this way, and the general answer was that they - like most who wind up in politics - love this stuff. The television story is on in about an hour... KVUE at 6pm (now in HD!!!!)
TX State Representative Mark Strama should be commended for not just getting young people involved but providing education about the process. Our society has become ever more complex and subsequently so has the government that controls it. There are multiple jurisdiction, budgets, bureaucratic organization, election strategies and organizations, etc. Unfortunately, Texas students receive only one semester of government and one semester of economics. This certainly is not enough time for Texas high school students to learn what they need to know about the various governments they will live under and should vote for as civil-minded adults. Hopefully more elected officials will create similar academies as well as review Texas curriculum to expand and enhance government and economic education.
Even though majority of the students are in high school, there's an elementary school kid participating as well. It goes to show it doesn't matter how young you are, there will be those who will understand campaigns and political races and views of a politican.