College students volunteer more than they vote, civic report says
by Maya Srikrishnan | Daily Texan (University of Texas)
Issue date: 11/14/07 Section: News
(U-WIRE) — Today's generation of college students are becoming increasingly active in their local communities. But as their volunteer hours are growing, so is their political indifference, according to a report released Wednesday.
In the report, researchers from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement found this generation, the Millennial Generation or Generation Y, to be turned off or polarized by national politics, instead engaging more at the local level than the generations before them.
"Youth have a greater tendency to shy away from politics because they're just learning politics," said Mary Dixson, associate director of the University of Texas College of Communication's Annette Strauss Institute For Civic Participation. "It's easier to ladle soup into a bowl for a homeless person than to sit down and look at the economic policies dealing with housing."
Because it takes longer to see the effects of politics, it's easy for students to get discouraged, but they need to be able to attack issues at the political level to change the roots of problems, Dixson said.
"You have fewer and fewer young people seeing voting as a civic obligation. It's not necessarily that this generation is the first one to hate politics; it's just the first one to hate politics and not participate," she said.
Dixson said she thinks the number of 18- to 25-year-old voters will increase as political issues become more relevant to their lives.
Communication studies associate professor Sharon Jarvis will present a paper next week at the National Communication Association that addresses the same issue that many young people prefer to volunteer than to vote.
Individuals are participating in nonprofit causes because they view them as disconnected from the political system, according to her paper.
"Volunteering can help a community or a cause 'today,' but volunteering without political action does little to solve a problem for 'tomorrow,'" Jarvis wrote in an e-mail.
In the report, researchers from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement found this generation, the Millennial Generation or Generation Y, to be turned off or polarized by national politics, instead engaging more at the local level than the generations before them.
"Youth have a greater tendency to shy away from politics because they're just learning politics," said Mary Dixson, associate director of the University of Texas College of Communication's Annette Strauss Institute For Civic Participation. "It's easier to ladle soup into a bowl for a homeless person than to sit down and look at the economic policies dealing with housing."
Because it takes longer to see the effects of politics, it's easy for students to get discouraged, but they need to be able to attack issues at the political level to change the roots of problems, Dixson said.
"You have fewer and fewer young people seeing voting as a civic obligation. It's not necessarily that this generation is the first one to hate politics; it's just the first one to hate politics and not participate," she said.
Dixson said she thinks the number of 18- to 25-year-old voters will increase as political issues become more relevant to their lives.
Communication studies associate professor Sharon Jarvis will present a paper next week at the National Communication Association that addresses the same issue that many young people prefer to volunteer than to vote.
Individuals are participating in nonprofit causes because they view them as disconnected from the political system, according to her paper.
"Volunteering can help a community or a cause 'today,' but volunteering without political action does little to solve a problem for 'tomorrow,'" Jarvis wrote in an e-mail.
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