CONWAY - International travel, grass-roots political activism and old-fashioned paying attention are keys to motivating college students to engage in democracy, panelists said in a national get-out-the-vote campaign kickoff at the University of Central Arkansas on Thursday.
The One Student-One Vote forum was the first of three college campus discussions intended to inspire students to vote in the November 2008 election. Organizers also hope to encourage students to push political leaders to address global poverty and disease.
"One person can create a tremendous amount of light for a lotof people simply by opening their eyes, looking around and choosing to participate," said Elaine Fox, a UCA professor who leads student trips to Central America to help impoverished people.
Each student should travel abroad to see how the rest of the world lives, Fox said, even if it means making sacrifices athome to pay for it. Witnessing the suffering of a hungry child has changed the perspectives of many students, she said.
"They begin to see that there is a role that they can play to improve humanity," she said.
The discussion was hosted by UCA, The ONE Campaign to Make Poverty History and Politico, a Washington-based political news publication. The other two discussions will be next month at the University of Washington in Seattle and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
The nonpartisan ONE Campaign chose Arkansas for the kickoff event because more cities in the state have passed proclamations in support of ONE than any other state and current and past governors have been vocal supporters of the campaign, ONE spokesman Kimberly Cadena said.
"We wanted to recognize the groundswell of support that's present here by hosting one of the events in Arkansas," she said.
The discussion was moderated by Politico Executive Editor Jim VandeHei, who asked the panel members how they can tell if students are involved without the presence of physical acts such asprotests and sit-ins.
"Is there less activism or is that activism channeled through the Internet?" he asked.
"We're not storming the streets like we should be," UCA student and panelist Brooks Cato said, explaining that the Internet can play too large a role in student action. "It doesn't carry as much weight as our physical presence would."
State Sen. Gilbert Baker, R-Conway, said students would be surprised to find how welcome their participation would be in a local political campaign. The Conway Republican said the tone of state and national political debates discourages some from getting involved.
"It seems like it's such a nasty blood sport that some folks are just turned off," Baker said. "Well if you are turned off then the way to change that is to get involved and bring things back to a discussion of policies and issues that are important."
The image of foreign aid is changing because of concerned college students and grass-roots activists, said national security expert and panelist Jeffrey Laurenti of the Century Foundation. During the Cold War, sending money abroad was seen as a way to buy influence. That support dropped off after the Cold War ended.
Grass-roots campaigns, such as the church-led Jubilee 2000 toforgive Third-World debt and The ONE Campaign, have increased foreign aid from the U.S. and other nations, he said.
"It's been a major turnaround and it's because we're not selling aid now as a way to buy influence," Laurenti said. "We're selling aid now to buy development, to reduce maternal mortality, to create opportunities for education."
Arkansas, Pages 13, 16 on 10/26/2007