Students Call for Change and Wonder About Their Own Lack of Knowledge

Young people want change, but many students feel unprepared to vote and they think that the presidential election highlights serious gaps in their education. They seem to lack a clear understanding about how the United States government and the election process works. Some are angry and have strong opinions but have not done little research, while others who did look into the issues and the candidates feel somewhat reassured.

“We weren’t given the tools or the foundation of how you vote, or how the Senate works in practice, and how to take part,” Chloe Fox said. The City College of New York (CCNY) advertising and PR major said he feels that the world is a mess and questions whether voting will matter. “There’s just hopelessness, like everything sucks. I always say why does everything have to go to shit when I am an adult? It’s very overwhelming, there’s too many things going wrong and it’s all on us to fix it. I will be voting for Kamala. Do I like her? No. But to keep doing advocacy and living my normal life I have to. It’s better to know that you tried than to live with doing nothing at all,” Fox said

Other students we spoke to at CCNY said they are still unsure about who to vote for. They do not like either former President Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris.

“We are not happy, they both suck” said Sharon Gardine, a CCNY senior majoring in political science. She said that she hasn’t done much research about either candidate. But she does not appreciate Trump’s insensitive remarks, most recently his lies about Haitian immigrants in Spring, Ohio. “In Springfield, they are eating the dogs, they are eating the cats. They are eating the pets of the people that live there,” Trump said during the debate in October. Gardine also points at Harris’s lack of presence as a Vice President during the Biden Administration as another reason she is unmoved by the elections.

Laura Ferreira, a junior in sociology and sonic arts, seemed angry when she spoke about Vice President Harris. She said, “Kamala has done nothing for the working class and Palestine. She says she cares but you can tell she does not.” Ferreira is unable to vote, but even if she could she said there would be no worthy candidate for her to pick. As a minority she does not feel seen by them and has no plans to look into either candidates’ policies.

Laiba Rashid, a junior majoring in biology, said she had not looked into the candidates’ plans. But she said she didn’t like Kamala Harris. She pointed to the large amounts of money the Biden administration has sent to Israel. “I am voting for Trump, because at least he cares about the U.S,” she said.

Soleil Blanc is a junior in advertising and public relations. She got interested in Kamala Harris after she saw her strong advocacy for abortion rights and social security benefits for the elderly. Blanc began to feel hopeful and optimistic about the elections. She said, “I did not know much about Kamala Harris, but I heard that she locked up a lot of minorities for minor marijuana possession. So, I did not have positive feelings about her. But after looking into her my opinions about the election changed.”

To close the education gap, candidates may have to consider making bigger moves to let younger people know that they can make a change, and their votes are not just numbers.