This week, Gen-Y Magic will be profiling 4 young leaders on the political landscape. All 4 are dedicated to covering the involvement of young voters in progressive politics and write for multiple sites and communities. All 4 are players in Future Majority, a site started in in August of 2006 by Michael Connery, Alex Urevick-Acklesberg, and Josh Koenig. Today we are chatting with Craig Berger. Craig can also be found writing on his own site, Politics of the Common Good, a a site that is examining the Development of Common Good Politics through Political Commentary. 

Gen-Y Magic: How can Gen-Y make a difference today in the leadership of our government?

Craig: Well, to start, the most immediate thing Generation Y can do is organize themselves and their peers this fall and turn out to vote in surprising numbers on Election Day. This would be a statement to our country's leaders that the Millennial Generation, once and for all, can not be ignored.

While the chances of this happening are somewhat good in my estimation, in order to make a large difference, the effort can't stop there. Over the past few decades, this country has gotten away from Kennedy's prescription for civic health:  

"Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country."  

Much of the political dialogue has centered on identity politics; campaigns have become more rational-efficient, forgetting principles and taking on a "win at all costs" approach. With the Millennial traits of collaboration and pragmatism (and the generation's penchant for service), Generation Y has a great opportunity -- before and after this election -- to exhibit the kind of problem-solving skills we will need in Washington for decades to come. In order to make a large-scale difference, Millennials need to be willing to reinject some Kennedyesque patriotism into this nation's civic life by getting involved in local service and political organizations.

GYM: Working for a college, are teachers and institutions up to speed on technology and the demands of the Millennial Generation?

Craig: First, I can't and won't pretend to speak for all college employees, as no institution has the same approach to technology. But as a Millennial employee of my institution, I notice a concerning and perhaps predictable trend: many staff members are catching on to what they think is the latest in technological development, but only by the time the Millennial students have already found the next best thing. For instance, at a time when residence halls are filled with laptops (almost all of which came already configured for Wi-Fi), the college seems content with offering a few hotspots in various buildings on campus. With Millennials wanting, and mostly used to, immediate access to information no matter where they are, my institution is missing a large opportunity because they are satisfied with meeting a standard that was set among my generation five to ten years ago.

With the increased focus on green issues among Millennials, one way to please Generation Y students would be to transition many collegiate operations to paperless systems. To its credit, my institution is setting the stage for something like this; Information and Technology Services has set up its own portal for students, faculty, and staff to use that is similar to Blackboard, WebCT, and other sites that host classroom material online. But other systems can go online as well, and at many schools, they have. Students can be reading scholarly material online; professors can be incorporating more interactive multimedia into their lectures. Professors and staff can utilize small devices given to students that allow them to respond to information in real-time as they receive it; so instead of filling out the tiresome course and professor evaluations on paper, they can do so online in a confidential manner. Professors can record their lectures, uploading them to iTunes as podcasts, and allowing students to download it and pore over it as they review for their exam. RAs can electronically disseminate videos that are simultaneously humorous and informative to their residents that explain college policies and procedures.

But the most important thing for an institution to do for Millennials is create a culture of innovation. The Mac advertising campaign is instructive here: when Millennial students think of something as refreshing, new, and purposeful, they are drawn to it. If an institution wants to be "up to speed" on technological issues and Millennial demands, it needs to be ahead of the curve, thinking of things that I haven't even touched upon in the second paragraph. And as an important corollary, they need to make sure that Millennials know this is going on, so they can spread the news themselves.

GYM: Do you see Gen-Y getting more political information from Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert than shows on CNN and NBC? Is that hurting Gen-Y or helping to raise awareness of political situations?

Craig: I think that the level of popularity that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert enjoy among Millennials may be a bit overestimated (even though it is real), and I worry that the extensive coverage that the Stewart/Colbert phenomenon gets leads to the false conclusion that Millennials need to have their news chewed for them before they can digest it. Millennials might like to combine their news with sarcasm, but they still want it to be substantive. What is disappointing is that the news delivered with a satirical approach (like Stewart and Colbert) is often more substantive than the false debates that fill time on the supposedly credible cable news networks of CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News. The humorous approach also allows students to feel good about news; if you took time to monitor the newscasts of major news organizations, you'd be dead if pessimism could kill. Millennials are optimistic by nature, and so we know that outlets delivering news in a non-traditional or fun way attracts Generation Y.

In the end, with the plethora of media outlets Millennials are subjected to, it takes more work to sort through the clutter in order to find the real, substantive, and useful information needed to fulfill their responsibilities as an American citizen. While I do think that, for the most part, Generation Y does a decent job of filtering out what they don't need/want to hear and getting the information they need, the education system and parents in our country should be stepping up their efforts at teaching students critical thinking skills and civic knowledge -- not just math and science. Students who are on the precipice of adulthood need to be prepared throughout their youth to critically examine the information they are presented.

GYM: Celebrities, musicians, actors, etc are getting very vocal about this year’s elections. Hip-hop, as an example, has thrown direct support behind Barrack Obama. What can that do for a campaign?

Craig: I have a mixed reaction to celebrity endorsements. For instance, if Jon Voight or Tom Hanks endorses a candidate, this does not affect my choice at all, and I'm not optimistic that it would impact many other decisions either. But if there's a particularly hot music act that attracts hundreds of thousands of people on a summer tour in an election year, it could be very helpful. Think about what could be done if he or she incorporates a coordinated text message blast to concertgoers' friends into the show; research shows that this peer-to-peer outreach is much more effective at getting people to vote than a run-of-the-mill celebrity endorsement.

GYM: Why should Gen-Y get involved and get educated right now and not tomorrow?

Craig: Barack Obama often quotes Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Beyond Vietnam" address at the Riverside Church (April 4, 1967) when he stresses the importance of getting engaged. I believe that King's words say more to answer this question than I ever could, so I'd like to share them with everyone:

"We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood-it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, 'Too late.'"

Our future seems to be darkening by the days. But even though the tragedies in this country have mounted – the mismanagement of Iraq, the mismanagement of Katrina, corruption, a Constitution that was flushed down the toilet, a surplus that turned into the largest deficit ever, a government that won’t act on the climate crisis, and the squandering of any moral standing this country had – it is still an opportunity. Generation Y has the pragmatism, collaboration, and optimism to chip away at these challenges; but we have to apply each of those traits by getting involved and embracing our civic responsibility.

GYM: Thanks Craig, you are now off the Gen-Y Hot Seat! Check out the feature with Mike Connery on the Gen-Y Hot Seat for more Gen-Y Political information.