A New Effort To Pull Youth Into Civic Life
WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, May 12) -- America's young adults want to get involved in community and political activism, but don't have the proper venue or structure to do so, according to actor and activist Andrew Shue.
Shue, best known for his role on "Melrose Place," announced Tuesday the group he founded, "Do Something," is teaming up with "Rock the Vote" on a new $4.7 million initiative. Sponsored by The Pew Charitable Trust Fund, the hope is to persuade young people ages 18-26 to get involved in civic and political life.
"It's important because young people need to be motivated and inspired and then channeled into community building because they are the ones who have the most energy, the most time, the most to lose," Shue said. "So if anybody is going to inspire change in our neighborhoods it's going to be the youth.
"You have to actually be able to hold onto their arm and walk
them down the hall and expose them to something and let them experience
something before they are going to catch on, so we have to set up systems that expose everybody to being social entrepenuers, being leaders, " he said.
The two groups will mount an advertising campaign, including TV and
print public service announcements and a 15-city tour to promote local
involvement. They also will offer one-week training sessions to community organizations in several pilot cities, including Washington D.C., Newark, N.J., New York and Atlanta, before expanding nationwide.
The training sessions will teach organizations how to reach and
recruit young adult volunteers.
According to a study conducted by Pew, 37 percent of young adults have volunteered their time in the past, but only 3 percent have participated in politics. In 1996, 32 percent of people age 18 to 24 voted, down from 43 percent in 1992.
The national survey of 1,002 people of those ages
was conducted by Princeton Survey Research from Oct. 21 to Nov. 17,
1997. The margin of error was +/- 3 percentage points.
"They say young people are cynics," rapper and activist Chuck D
said during the announcement at Washington's Planet Hollywood.
"But young people are only cynics because older people are cynics.
Young people can make a change but they need to be structured and
organized."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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