Culture & Community | Education & Youth | New Haven Schools | Voting
Participate in democracy. Hold your values close when deciding what candidate you vote for. Above all, exercise your right to vote, and be a proud active voter.
That advice came to New Haven earlier this month, as former Georgia State Rep. Stacey Abrams addressed students and educators at The Hopkins School for a discussion on the importance of democracy and voting rights. In the audience, students from both Hopkins and eight different New Haven public high schools weighed in on their individual role in democracy, even if they will not be eligible to vote in the Nov. 5 presidential election.
“I think that it is vital for the New Haven Public Schools community to be gathered together as one group in unity for one distinct cause,” said James Hillhouse High School and ACES Educational Center for the Arts (ECA) junior Jason Thomas. “The community of New Haven is heavily dependent on what the youth is doing. Having the youth gather together to do and learn things about our society and nation are vital to the growth of our community,”
Thomas’ point came to life throughout the event, as students from across the city hung onto Abrams’ words and followed up with questions and reflections of their own. In conversation with journalist and legal reporter Emily Bazelon, Abrams focused on the sheer importance and necessity of voting.
For so many Americans, she reminded the audience, voting was not always a right afforded by the U.S. Constitution. Now and always, she sees that right as fundamental to the survival of democracy.
That doesn’t always mean that someone has to like the process or the person that they cast a ballot for, she added. But it does mean that they have a responsibility to vote. She encouraged attendees to focus on issues and policies, rather than singular personalities.
“Voting is not magic,” she said. “Voting is medicine and sometimes medicine is bitter.”
“I just have to like the vision they have for the country I want to be in,” she later added.
Sitting in the audience, Thomas agreed. Like Abrams, “I think it is crucial to identify exactly how each candidate will impact them, their families, and their friends around them,” he said.
Around him in Hopkins’ gymnasium, young people dominated the audience, watching and listening intently. Speaking directly to them, Abrams noted the involvement and sway of young people in local and national politics.
“If you are interested—not in politics—if you’re interested in people's lives being better, in democracy, that becomes politics,” Abrams told the audience. Although her audience comprised mostly those just under the legal voting age, students and teachers alike clapped and cheered. Others jumped in to voice their agreement.
“Gen Z is the most ethnically diverse generation yet and the fastest growing segment of the electorate,” said Wilbur Cross High School Principal Matt Brown. “Having everyone together, considering the implications of the questions Ms. Abrams posed, all of this is something anyone who wants young people to be civically engaged and informed would want to see- and see more of!”
And indeed, many of the students left feeling grateful for the experience and the collaboration with the Hopkins community. Patrick Nardini, a junior at Engineering and Science University Magnet School (ESUMS), called the gathering a step in the right direction when school communities can often seem polarized or defined by a resource gap.
“I'm grateful that Hopkins found the opportunity and invited us, but I believe it should be done more often without necessarily the ‘help’ of outside sources like that,” Thomas chimed in. “I believe that the community of New Haven is heavily dependent on what the youth is doing. Having the youth gather together to do and learn things about our society and nation are vital to the growth of our community.
Nowhere was that power of youth clearer than during the second half of Abrams speech, as four high school students came to the stage to talk about what’s on their minds in this upcoming election, as well as ask specific questions about voting and politics.
They included Seniors from Wilbur Cross High School, High School in the Community, James Hillhouse High School, and Hopkins.
“Do you believe there’s an empathy gap between democrats and republicans, and if so how do you think that affects elections?” Wilbur Cross High School senior John Carlos Musser asked Abrams. Musser is also one of two student representatives on the New Haven Board of Education.
Abrams pointed to the distinction between empathy and advocacy. Empathy, she said, is the ability to feel the pain of another individual or group of people, whether or not they share the same beliefs. Advocacy is an action, the incentive to help someone that is in need despite ranging beliefs or standpoints on policy issues.
“There is an empathy and advocacy gap,” Abrams said. “When you can feel a person's pain but not be willing to solve a person's problem, that to me is a distinction.”
“We are better people when we combine empathy with advocacy,” she added. “We become better people when the people closest to the pain are closest to the power."
Abrams, who became involved in local politics at the age of 16, stressed the importance of getting involved in local and federal elections as early as possible, whether that means becoming an active participant in promoting a candidate, or simply educating communities on the importance of voting and knowing what is being voted on.
After the election is over and the candidate is chosen, Abrams explained, life will still have to go on regardless of the results. That’s why involvement before and after elections is so vital.
“No matter what happens you’re still here, you still have to survive and thrive and grow,” she said. With the Presidential Election just weeks away, the potential results are on the minds of many people within the New Haven community.
“I hope young people consider the collective power they have,” Brown said. “Both in the election and in civic life in general, first and foremost locally, and that a great deal of our political life happens at the municipal and state level.”
The top photo comes from reporter Allan Appel and our partners at the New Haven Independent. Grayce Howe was the Arts Paper's 2024 New Haven Academy intern and is now in her senior year. The New Haven Academy internship is a program for NHA juniors that pairs them with a professional in a field that is interesting to them. Grayce plans to continue writing for the Arts Paper throughout her senior year, so keep an eye out for her byline in these pages!