We both have argued that it is a make-or-break electoral facet of this campaign. A constant education-driven strategy to court young people will work, in my judgment, and could convert the Occupy sentiments into a tangible pro-Obama presence on the campaign trail. In short, the President needs to hit the road, as he did at the University of Michigan, for many months: amassing new momentum that builds off his Ann Arbor appearance and AFP headline: OBAMA APPEALS TO KEY YOUTH VOTE.
But, not so fast: As the Fort Myers, Fl.-based News-Press, a Gannett paper, has reported, the campaign excitement, neither for Obama nor the GOP frontrunners, has "created a stir on campus."
A wave of enthusiasm from college-age voters helped carry Barack Obama to the White House in 2008, but the excitement young adults had then is less apparent as the 2012 presidential election approaches – at least on the FGCU campus.In the story, students of Florida Gulf Coast University express dissatisfaction with partisan politics and reluctance to engage in Tuesday's GOP primary or in the campaign beyond. Returning to our theme of education, one student points to the political illiteracy of students (rather than their disillusionment) as the source of apathy.
Joseph Russo, an FGCU senior majoring in political science, said he is displeased with the way students view government.“People are not all apathetic, they are just politically illiterate,” said Russo, who said he already has cast his ballot for Mitt Romney. “When you are talking about the young vote, you are not talking about the most politically educated vote.”As Forbes contributor Peter Reilly writes about young people's relationships with business (in the corporate realm), "hooking up with Gen Y" can happen quickly and then sporadically on an off-and-on basis. But prolonged engagement with millennials is a trickier proposition. In the political sphere, where there is a candidate (not a high-tech product) and one whose policies haven't been visible enough in their daily lives, it is even for youth to rationalize their absence on Election Day.
Wes, the Pew Internet & American Life Project has created an online infographic (below) to visibly highlight the Center's research on the up and coming generation. This companion to their full report, "Millennials: Confident. Connected. Open to Change," data is useful to examine. Here is the first two paragraphs of their executive summary, with critical data points in bold.
Generations, like people, have personalities, and Millennials — the American teens and twenty-somethings who are making the passage into adulthood at the start of a new millennium — have begun to forge theirs: confident, self-expressive, liberal, upbeat and open to change. They are more ethnically and racially diverse than older adults. They’re less religious, less likely to have served in the military, and are on track to become the most educated generation in American history. Their entry into careers and first jobs has been badly set back by the Great Recession, but they are more upbeat than their elders about their own economic futures...
They embrace multiple modes of self-expression. Three-quarters have created a profile on a social networking site. One-in-five have posted a video of themselves online. Nearly four-in-ten have a tattoo (and for most who do, one is not enough: about half of those with tattoos have two to five and 18% have six or more). Nearly one-in-four have a piercing in some place other than an earlobe — about six times the share of older adults who’ve done this. But their look-at-me tendencies are not without limits. Most Millennials have placed privacy boundaries on their social media profiles. And 70% say their tattoos are hidden beneath clothing.Wes, based on your reading on this Pew report, both the summary and the graphic below, what is most MISLEADING about their findings, particularly in the context of youth's role in the 2012 campaign?
Created by: Online Graduate Programs
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