This week on the Wheelhouse.

Young people and their engagement in politics and in civil discourse.

For Connecticut Public, I'm Frankie Graziano.

This is the Wheelhouse.

It's the show that brings politics to the people.

We got your weekly, weekly dose of politics in Connecticut and beyond right here.

And this hour, we're continuing our series speaking with college students about civic engagement.

The school year is winding down, as I'm told, and so are opportunities to engage in political debate and one of college's most important forums, the classroom.

Later, we're going to hear two Connecticut professors chime in on how they're fostering an environment that encourages healthy debate.

But first, we're going to hear from the students.

That's the most important thing.

Let's do that.

Mercy Purdue is an international studies and politics and government study at the University of Hartford.

Mercy, thank you so much for coming.

Thank you for having me.

So pumped to have you on to talk to you.

And you can see, two corps, left as it were, or excuse me, two are right.

I can't even think anymore.

That's fair.

Ferris Wade is a sociology and politics and government student at the University of Hartford.

Farah, thank you so much for being here.

I'm excited to be here.

I'm excited to have you on.

We're gonna have a nice conversation.

Are you a Gen Z student who is politically active?

Let us know.

Let us know why.

Give us a call (888) 720-9677, (888) 720-9677.

You could also leave a comment on our live stream on YouTube.

What does free speech and political engagement on a college campus?

That's going to be our first question look like to you.

Go ahead.

Mercy.

Oh, I guess it's knowing that you have the ability to have power and your voice holds influence on your campus.

And knowing that you can express your opinions, your beliefs, albeit supported by evidence and not fear ostracization from your peers or from people higher up.

How long have you had a voice on campus for just, just some quick background into into some of the leadership that you've had and, Yeah, yeah.

So past three years, actually, this is one of my first years not a member of student government on campus.

Last year I was chair of PR for the Student Government Association.

I've been a student ambassador for four years now for the College of Arts and Sciences.

I was an intern with the Governor Jodi Rell center on campus as well.

Quite the resume.

Yeah.

I'm a founding member of a campus activism group called Activate UHart on campus.

And I think I think that's fair.

Farah, what about you?

Tell me about your resume a little bit here.

All right.

Your leadership.

I'm in the hot seat.

Yeah.

Last year, I served as student body president.

And then the year before that, I was student body vice president.

And then the year before that, I was, I spent a half a term, a student body vice president outside of the sophomore year.

Pretty much.

Yeah.

Yeah, I've been involved, actually, since freshman year.

I took over freshman year and I stayed on.

This year, I'm taking the chance to invest in myself and take that time.

And then over the past few years, I've been involved with campus committees, you know, talking to administration and talking to leaders, faculty Senate, about the concerns of students.

So those are my big ticket items on campus.

Through that lens, help me out with free speech and political engagement on a college campus.

And what's it like for you?

What does it mean to you?

I think universities are a unique environment because they're kind of like a smaller worlds that you're jumping into before you jump into the big pond.

And I think university free speech, what matters most is not just the conversations that are allowed to happen in the classroom, but the conversations that are happening on the campus community as a whole, and not just what the university is saying itself, but what they're platforming and what messages that they're championing.

I think that's most important, and I think college campuses are the time to test out what you think, how you think it, and how to express it.

And I think that environment is so unique you won't find that anywhere else.

I think building off a Ferris point, it's not just what is being said, but what's not being said and what conversations are being had on campus.

I think by reading between the lines a lot, you can see not just, certain political ideologies on college campuses, but also why there are certain things not being said, or what fears may surround conversations that are not being held even beyond just a classroom setting.

Even.

And just like in a personal conversation.

It sounds like you're trying to have those nuanced conversations.

I appreciate that very much.

The center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement found in 2023 that 40% of young people feel well informed enough to participate in politics.

How do you find your age group is is is doing in terms of keeping up with the politics?

I'll take that one.

Yeah.

Fair.

Go ahead.

I think it depends on who you're talking to.

We kind of live in a microcosm where our classes, our students who are passionate about politics and political discourse.

And so the peers that I'm seeing every day are students that listen to the radio, students that read articles and are well informed.

So I think it depends on what what you're invested into.

But I do think that social media plays a good role.

I think the older generation slate social media and how it connects to the news.

But I do think it's powerful to every day be able to get small doses of information.

And I, I don't think it's the be all end all for your information or your news.

It never should be.

But I think there's a strength there that, young people get to rely on and we get to kind of have the world at our fingertips, as people say.

And I think that's important, and I, I wouldn't disagree.

I think my peers are well informed.

I think there is better work to be done, but I don't think it's our generation that is, a bigger issue.

Okay.

Yeah, I totally agree.

I like the social media point.

I think it's very important for us to have that access.

Like, yes, algorithms can filter and create echo cause an echo chambers of what you are seeing.

But in a world where news media now is set behind paywalls.

It's important to have even tiny bits of access of information that you don't necessarily have to pay for each time.

Again, I think our generation is considering or everything going on relatively informed.

There's obviously a lot of work that can be done to make sure that, especially on like a local setting, local or municipal politics, there's a lot less there's a lot more of an information gap there.

Access is such an important word because people might not understand this because it's 2026 and it's like, wow, this can't be happening.

Some people don't have the internet still.

So, it's very key.

And important to talk about broadband access and just regular access.

I know you're talking more about the regular part of it, but it just made me think about that.

Not everybody has access, so it's good to talk about that.

I got to ask you guys, is the 2024 presidential election maybe even 26 now with midterms?

Is there some local stuff, anything recently?

Play a role in your interest in politics?

And if so, could you help us out?

Yeah, I think you guys would have been sophomores during the 2024 presidential election.

We were.

We were juniors, both interning at the governor M. Jodi Rell Center for Public Service.

Year and a half ago.

Yeah, we had the chance to organize watch parties, debate watch parties and voter registration drives through through the call center.

And election night watch party.

Yeah, I think, the election time is an interesting time because especially at that Connecticut level, you have students coming from, all over the country.

You know, the majority of your students are New York, new Jersey and the tri state area and the small percentage that are Connecticut voters.

It's that trying to engage them into what's going on in Connecticut, I think is really important for me.

What interested me the most was, you know, the overturn Roe v Wade, the overturn of affirmative action through students for Fair Admission versus Harvard.

And you see those bigger ticket items of kind of how the like not only the political landscape, but just landscape as a whole in the States was changing.

That was the biggest thing that interested me.

Over the election and my worries over what was going on not only at home, but also abroad, abroad and what we were contributing to.

Those are my my bigger worries.

Yeah.

I totally to echo, Vera's point, I think as an out-of-state student, it's definitely an interesting opportunity to be here to hear about local Connecticut politics and not really necessarily be a person who's directly contributed to contributing through, like, voting access.

But again, in communicating with my peers, making sure that they have all the information available, and I think for out-of-state students, there is an interesting realm where, you know, with the attacks on mail in ballots, the challenge that presents to them when it comes to being civically engaged in their home communities and local communities.

And I'm from New York City and surprisingly, New York City, the way that, local elections, the information available there, it's lacking.

It's often lacking.

There's very difficult to get up to date information on who's running and the platforms that they hold and doing that from home.

So doing that from out of state, it can be even more difficult.

So I think all things considered, there's we're okay.

We're hanging in there.

But to the point of that, the previous election, the presidential election, similar to fair, the overturning of Covid was a very large concern for me, but also just the rising authoritarian sentiment and internationally far right fascism rising internationally was a really big concern for me.

And I think in that point, I was just kind of interested in trying to see what we could do to slow that spread.

That sounds like you care very much about whether or not you trust the government to either, I guess, rule, or, excuse me, lead the people or sort of lead with an iron fist.

So how does trust or distrust in institutions shape participation for you?

I can definitely take that.

I think in our generation, someone mentioned earlier today when we first got here and said that we were politics students, that they were surprised that we weren't jaded or didn't approach politics with a kind of nihilistic sense.

And although we might, we might not feel that way.

I feel a larger sentiment in our generation is kind of like my vote doesn't really count, or what I do doesn't really count going through the system.

And I'll be it.

There are instances where I too feel that way.

I find that especially after seeing the, I'm totally forgetting what case this was.

Citizens United.

Yeah.

And the presidential immunity, Supreme Court case a couple years ago.

It kind of feeds into that sentiment of people feeling like there really isn't nothing that we can do.

There is no trust in our government.

Do we really live in a democracy?

And kind of conversations around that.

And it kind of leads to a concern, especially among other generation, about kind of feeling hands offish when it comes to elections, specifically smaller elections or even in large presidential elections of not really participating through voting and more so other means fair.

Yeah.

Do you think there's some inorganic element to that where, like, somebody really wants you to not pay attention, they really want you to be disengaged.

So maybe that becomes a narrative.

Absolutely.

I think it's interesting when we level critiques at our generation about our lack of engagement, because my question is, what's our buy in to participating in the political system largely for our lives, the system has struggled to make strides in the issues that are affecting us, whether that's in regulations for firearms, big strides for climate change, or strides in terms of health care costs, education costs.

And we're we're graduating now into a job market that's struggling and into a reality where the federal administration can determine, you know, left and right whether degrees are considered professional and they can change the rules on federal grants.

So I think it's interesting.

Yeah, it's interesting to critique the younger generation for not being involved when this is the struggle that we're dealing with.

Some people are struggling to fill their tank of gas and buy groceries.

We can't ask them on top of that to be overly involved and to commit themselves something extra.

Being involved, being civically engaged, it's a luxury and it's a luxury that's not afforded to many.

It's so fascinating.

And I'm going to move on because we don't have a ton of time today.

But, I talked to so many students and their big concern every time I talk to them about their generation, what's marking your generation?

They're like, it's firearm drills in class, being a kid and having to do a shooting drill.

And I can imagine when you're saying, what's the buy in?

When it's like, I'm doing all these scary drills in school, when I'm a little kid, and then, is anybody actually doing anything about it?

So I could see the frustration there.

But let me move on to say that over the last couple of years, nearly 150 universities, including Yale, have adopted policies of institutional neutrality.

That means they're staying quiet on hot button issues as political pressure rises against higher ed nationwide.

What's your reaction to it?

Oh, I mean you have as well adopted institutional tragedy last year.

And I think universities and colleges over the last few years came to face the reality that is trying to advance productive dialog among students and also balance interests as a private institution.

I think you are isn't unique in that neither are the other schools in Connecticut, whether that's Yale or the state schools such as UConn that adopted institutional neutrality.

I think the bigger fear is around how Partizanship can affect their popularity, can affect their their money.

I think those are the bigger ticket items.

And as institutions, their interest is in protecting their well-being and the institutional well-being.

And so the struggle for students is that sometimes our interests go against that.

And as a result, there's no room for our voices when we're calling into question policies that aren't beneficial towards us.

And I think colleges as a whole are kind of coming to a reckoning of what comes next.

Yeah, I guess looking at higher educational institutions, balancing institutional duality with, progression of knowledge and information and resource and research, I should say, I think of the trans debate and how being neutral in one sense may be going against what the hard science says, what the research says.

And I think in that sense, a kind of it doesn't call into question, but I think it kind of challenges what your role is as an educational institution.

Like Mary said, juggling that with being a private institution, having to maintain finances, having to maintain a budget line, kind of plays into that as well.

And I think with concerns of retaliation from the federal government, there's a lot of sorry drive to be as.

An complicated as possible, uncertain, uncertain, situations, maintaining some kind of neutrality so that you don't have to fear, like Columbia, for being kind of retaliation and having funds pulled and having your international students threatened and that kind of fear that comes with that.

And it's not just necessarily money or that institution doing that.

It's other institutions as well.

Because even with political power, staying on message and focus on sort of global globalist issues or a populist issues, excuse me, populist issues, may be better for your bottom line than focusing on what we call culture issues, and that can do more harm.

And, and universities, you say it kind of goes against what the students want so it can end up doing more harm, I would imagine, than good in terms of shaping policy.

Would you all tell me what you think?

Or.

Excuse me, actually, I want to ask you about this.

For its part, the advocates of institutional neutrality believe that colleges or universities take a stance on issues.

It can also quell dissent.

So, how do you react to that?

Are you guys being quiet as a result or, are you having issues with them wanting to do that, or are you seeing that maybe your school or other schools are trying to quell dissent?

I think that's on paper.

I think institutional ality can have its merits on the surface, kind of this idea that, you know, we won't comment on anything so we can foster growth and learning and dialog on everything.

But in practice, that's not what institutional child does.

In practice, it things that are considered not political, are those are the those are the interests that the university wants to advance.

And so they'll choose to comment on certain things and deem them as not political, deem them as safe topics to discuss, and then interest that they're not interested in are deemed as political and deemed as things that they can't comment on.

So I find that interesting that where, you know, proponents of institutional data are saying that it offers room for more dialog when in reality it sets the stage for who gets to say a safe dialog, who gets to define productive dialog.

I think you can also say the same.

The the what?

Proponents of internal institutional neutrality are saying the same thing about institutional neutrality.

Having a institution that is not taking any kind of platform or any kind of opinion at all, for students who have an opinion that may be seen as like very sad, controversial or against the norm or subversive, they may feel targeted or may feel unsupported by their institutions and thus pull themselves away from dialog or discourse that may be seen as like very sad, deemed political and unsafe to to discuss.

You've been listening to mercy do and Ferris Wade students at the University of Hartford.

They're going to stick with us after this break.

We're going to continue our discussion on political discourse and what we can do to create a safe environment for disagreement on and off campus.

You're listening to the Wheelhouse.

Give us a call if you want to talk eight at 87209677 and stay tuned.

After these words.

This is the Wheelhouse from Connecticut Public Radio.

I'm Frankie Graziano.

This hour, we're talking about engagement in civics and political discourse with two college students.

And what a time to do it.

It's the end of the year.

Graduation is coming up fast for our two guests specifically.

Fingers crossed, fingers crossed.

I think you guys are going to do it.

I'm very confident in you.

Mercy Purdue is an international students.

Studies and politics and government student at the University of Hartford.

I'm about to have my morning.

Burp I apologize.

Mercy.

Thanks so much for being here.

Thank you.

Ferris Wade is a sociology and politics and government student at the University of Hartford.

Thank you so much for coming on here.

I want to say, what do you see youngsters are doing to make a difference?

We hope you'll join the conversation.

Give us a call at (888) 720-9677, (888) 720-9677.

Long academic year since the fall semester started.

Here are some of the things we've seen.

The assassination of conservative podcaster Charlie Kirk.

The election of a socialist mayor in New York City, Zoran Mamdani.

You got your U.S.

Army airstrikes in Iran.

How have any of these events, if you could point to one in particular, kind of shape the discourse that you heard?

Yeah.

I think it's an interesting time to be a university student, because you walk into class and the especially in our majors and the professors are ready to throw out curriculum and have those current conversations, it's tough to focus on the nitty gritty in political theory when there's so much going on in the world.

And to add in a few headlines, everything that happened with President Maduro out of Venezuela, and, you know, everything that's going on in the world, honestly, there's new headlines every day.

And so we're playing that game of what to discuss and what's important and where to put our energy, especially as we're winding down on our capstones and our 20 page papers at the end of the semester.

I think the overall my time at university, we've had some really hot button issues, come up.

And I think the struggle with those bigger issues is that it's hard to wade through them and to determine what which one, two terms you're determines your attention and where you should be kind of pointing your priorities.

I think those bigger ticket items that are happening out of the Middle East, for me personally, a few years ago, everything that went on, and is still going on in Gaza was a really big focus for me and a big struggle for me to focus on class when things were going on around the world.

It's tough to focus on the curriculum when it feels like people back home are are facing, you know, facing things that I'll never face and I'll never be able to experience.

And it's it's a tough thing to, to swallow.

And institutions may not want you to talk about it too.

So how can you explore what you're going through?

Okay.

Yeah.

I think for us, especially as politics students having conversations, about traditionally what happens about what systems are in place and what is the norm.

And then coming into class that morning with the headline that just completely races out of that, you erases everything that was that what it was.

And having to approach this brand new kind of world that we're living in, with, then looking to your professors for hope.

But this is also the first time that this has ever happened for them as well.

Yeah.

And kind of embracing that together and going through this together and trying to navigate that is definitely something I wasn't expecting.

Coming into university.

This is something I deeply appreciate about Gen Z, because I think you better than any generation is like, no, this is not normal.

Yeah.

Whereas we're always like, I don't know, maybe other kids will do this as millennials, but, I'm always like, is this normal?

And I'm asking somebody that's, older than me and they're like, yeah, you know, and you take it at face value, but it's easy for us to say that, you know, Gen Z can or can't handle something when, you guys are going through quite a bit.

Yeah.

And, and the system isn't normal.

The system isn't normal.

And even in instances where the system is normal and working as it's supposed to work, our generation kind of questions.

Well, is that right?

Is that what it's supposed to be doing?

Is that how the system should be working?

So I think that's something that we kind of.

In March, we had President Michael Roth, and, you heard professor, Belal Suku, who's going to join us later on in the show, who, talked about how colleges and universities were once at the forefront of political protest, but institutions more cautious today.

Maybe they're more neutral.

Hundreds of students were targeted by student government administration from 2020 through 2024 for their free speech.

How should institutions respond when that was at least according to one study?

How should, institutions respond when student activism directly challenges their authority or legitimacy?

Well, sometimes I find it interesting when administration feels targeted by certain call outs, when students are discussing their frustrations with bureaucracy and their frustrations with corrupt systems.

I find it interesting when administration self-identifies and takes offense to kind of things that might not have have even had them in the conversation.

When we're talking to for the world as a whole.

And I think administrators as a whole, at all universities and colleges need to have a reckoning of their responsibility to allow students to grow and to to have a wider environment to explore and to protest.

And we look at student protests throughout history and the majority of student protests, in my opinion, have been kind of slated on the right side of history.

And students are always at the forefront of questioning.

We are, I thought, unique time in life or we have the time to to question and to learn and grow.

And I think administrators need to take a step back and to realize that our questions are not directed at them.

Oftentimes, they're directed at the world at large.

And their biggest, support that they can give is to help students navigate that and to just give the time to say, you know, this is what we're gonna let you explore.

And if they agree, disagree.

I don't think it's their place to enforce, to enforce.

Otherwise.

And with colleges being at the forefront of protest, that's pressure on you all to respond.

So, I mean, it's kind of your job to respond when something happens.

Absolutely.

And I think when you're working on 9 to 5, there is no room for, you know, to go out and march at protests.

That's why things are scheduled so in advance.

But when you're a college student and there is kind of those gaps in time in your schedule, there's that privilege and that time to to explore and to protest.

And I think that's super unique.

And we can't get rid of that.

That's not something I, I think should be removed from the university environment, nor should it be something that we're striving towards.

So much of today's, rhetoric and political rhetoric is heated and divisive.

What can we do on campus to change that?

I think we need to change it.

I think people sometimes get uncomfortable with confrontation and become feel discomfort when there is not just differences of opinion, but differences in values and differences in strongly held beliefs.

And oftentimes that is seen as a personal attack.

And it may not necessarily be, I think in discourse on college campuses, you know, I think of recent events in Gaza, recent events in the Middle East, and the conversations that were held around that and how that was approached peer to peer on campus, but also by administration in certain areas, just to college campuses at large.

And the divisiveness around that and how it was kind of seen as like a negative thing to be divisive on or like, we don't really need to have this kind of you or you need to have this view or that view or what have you.

And divisive discourse can be beneficial.

Sometimes, unless you're challenged on your belief and challenged in a way that really makes you sit and think about it and makes you confront yourself in that way, there is really no room for you to grow and for you to develop your own opinions or develop or deepen your ideas.

I think if you're in a position where if someone engages in discourse with you and it becomes divisive and you don't know where else to go from, that, you don't have anything else to say to kind of support your backing or support your view.

And that's not saying like personal attacks is a good thing, obviously.

But you can't, you know, you no longer can support your opinion then.

Then I think there needs to be some kind of discussion with yourself about why you hold certain beliefs or where those beliefs are coming from, or what you're doing to support that idea.

Last question for you guys in terms of shaping policy, what real power to young people have right now, not just in theory but in practice.

Like, do you both have any experience doing this, sort of wielding your power or at least being able to access it to have agency?

Absolutely.

I think young people, to some extent, the messaging has always been that young people are the leaders of tomorrow.

I think that's wrong with the leaders of today, and there's so much strength in regaining that and recognizing that everyone in the world right now wants our attention, and that attention is valuable currency.

And if we choose to spend it wisely, I think there's so much power that can be done.

It makes me think of the quote by tip O'Neill our politics is local.

Getting involved on the local level, whether that's through town councils, the municipal level, the state level.

I think that's so important.

Being engaged like that can make a world of a difference.

I don't think we can save the world, changed the world at large.

But I do think that as long as we all focus on changing where we are and saving our own communities and working towards that, that it'll add up to something greater.

It's it's not a sum of our individual actions, but a sum of what we can all work towards.

Yeah.

I think again, on a local level, a lot more of the changes that we do there and a lot more of the work we do there is directly influencing you in directly impacting what you do day to day.

And I think as a generation, we kind of get lost in the grandness of it all.

On the largeness of the world.

And forget about school board elections, forget about local politics and town halls and things like that.

And we tend to also forget that we do vote with our wallets, and we vote with our attention and our currency and our, the things that we give value to.

And a lot of times, especially in a system like we have today with the Tea Party system, the things that you support as a whole, the things that you value, if you can sit there and change that locally, it will eventually impact the larger a larger group.

And I think especially like a city like Hartford, like large major cities where there are large groups of young people, there's a lot more change that can be done.

And you see that in New York with the election of the Ron Mamdani, the concerns that our generation have, the conversations of people saying, well, the young people were just there, too idealistic.

They don't know what they're doing.

They've never had a job before.

And the concern that young folks have and it's like, this is our life.

This is what's happening now.

And again, we're not the leaders of tomorrow.

We're not we we need to be worried about tomorrow, but we can't worry about tomorrow if we're not focusing on today.

And if I can just jump in and say, I would think that I would say that people across Connecticut, especially people our age, are leading the charge.

I knew people my age in high school who ran for boards of education, boards of zoning, I know people who are involved on our college campus with organizing.

I'm personally involved with the local election, and I so I think that leveling the critique that young people are not engaged, I don't think is true.

We are engaged in different ways, and there are young people that are getting involved, on the local level, students that are coming to testify at the KGaA on bills that they're a fan of.

And I think obviously we'd love to see more of that.

But I do think that we're we're doing our best.

It sounds like more people in Connecticut are getting involved that are in Gen Z and actually running for office, and we're going to talk about that next with Jonathan Wharton and Bilal Sekou.

But before we go there, mercy pay do a student at the University of Hartford.

Mercy, thank you so much for coming on the show.

Thank you for having me.

Also with us, Ferris Wade, also a student at Ewart Farah.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you so much for having me.

Congratulations on all your success.

Congratulations on graduating.

We're looking forward to what you guys do in the future.

Thank you.

Thank you.

After the break, we're going to talk to Jonathan and Bilal.

As I mentioned hit us up if you want to talk to us; (888) 720-9677, (888) 720-9677.

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This is the Wheelhouse from Connecticut Public Radio.

I'm Frankie Graziano.

Phenomenal conversation we just had with two college students earlier in the hour.

We heard them talk about where the magic happens, so to speak, with campus political discourse.

Now, let's talk to two of our Wheelhouse regulars, a couple of professors that talk to poly sci students about this kind of thing.

The law.

Sekou, the associate professor of politics and government at the University of Hartford Go Hawks.

Jonathan Wharton, an associate professor of political science and urban affairs at Southern Connecticut State University.

So I was.

Running out of time on the show.

Be brief.

If you're going to call in (888) 720-9677, (888) 720-9677 Belore.

We talk to these students.

They're from you University.

What's your reaction to what they were saying?

Does this match what you kind of see at your class that UHart.

First of all, let me, you know, take my hat off to both of them.

I was nowhere near that articulate at that age.

And so I was really impressed with that conversation and the way in which they, you know, the insights they offered about, you know, discussions they have with, you know, with other students and also the way they define their generation.

And I think in many ways, they do represent what I think is the among the best that we see in the classroom.

And so I'm always amazed that, you know, whenever we dive into some of these issues that are, you know, in the news, right now, just how much the students are able to contribute, not all of them are willing to talk all the time, but the ones who do.

It's just an amazing conversation.

Whenever I'm in the classroom.

Jonathan, what do you think?

You know, I, I share both elements.

I think that, in fact, as I'm sure I will say the same thing, they sounded more like academics and, even faculty professorial like, makes me wonder if they're going to even venture into academia.

Down the road.

There's always interest is, you know, about too much in about public service and public office, but why not?

You know, considering their angles and perspectives.

Consider the classroom themselves down the road, one never knows.

But to get more specific, I was kind of struck by their interest in, and concerns surrounding, higher education administration and the things and pathways in which they could address some of the problems that persist on campus, not just University Hartford, but beyond.

So the questioning in many ways, you know, truth to power is, is one of them said, you know, the whole idea of reckoning and having a call to question about the purpose of academia, the administration is critical and quite frankly, needed.

Of course, you're talking to Bill and I, who are, who are professors.

So we'll have our own sentiments on that.

Yeah.

The institutional neutrality conversation.

Right.

But, you know, what was what was particularly interesting to me, obviously, every generation has their set of issues that they have to deal with while they're students.

I mean, for me, I came into sort of student activism around the anti-apartheid movement.

And, you know, also, I was close enough to what it occurred with the era in which Black Studies was created and a lot of activism around hiring more faculty of color.

And so, in many ways, my own sort of political growth and understanding of the world of politics happened during that period.

I mean, I cast my first vote for Jesse Jackson when he ran for president.

And so, you know, in that sense, I think, you know, this generation is being shaped by its own set of issues with regard to and what was particularly amazing about the conversation was just how much there on top of those sort of issues.

I don't know that I would have been able to have that conversation about the administration and, and neutrality and other things at that age, but again, all the more amazing.

But these are these are extraordinary students also, I mean, involved in student government, you know, running the political campaign.

I mean, these are just since.

Freshman and sophomore year.

They're they're top notch and they're getting involved.

The students mentioned that young people can vote, give testimony to a committee.

Obviously, we've seen more Gen Zers run for office.

I'm going to point this to Jonathan.

According to future caucus at bipartisan nonprofit, 1 in 4 candidates in 2024 was either a millennial or a Gen Z. Or that same year, Connecticut saw 21 members sworn in who were under 35.

Jonathan, write that down for us.

Why is this important to talk about?

Well, it's critical because, you know, as both leaders offered, this is important, especially at the state and local level.

Candidates need to be in somewhere.

And that's a great place to begin.

And so to see that interests at least start up is essential.

And I also speak towards the fact that it's no secret, Frankie, you, you know, spoke speak about this frequently on your show.

They're not enough candidates, running for even the General Assembly and having young people that fill that gap, that void is really, really important, for both generations and, you know, certainly, I'm sorry, generation Y and Z. Because running unopposed, it could be problematic if if there are not people to challenge people, there's not necessarily a term limit in place or something like that.

There's if there's nobody running, then the person that is currently in office runs unopposed.

Or they remain in office for decades.

Yeah.

Or to me, lawmakers, where that is the case, of course, they're coming from New Haven, so I don't have to tell you about that.

Earlier, Farah talked about young people not getting enough credit surrounding their political participation.

Future caucus also reported that these younger candidates were disproportionately eliminated from the races.

Why do you think that is and what are the effects when that happens?

Guys.

You know one thing I will say money.

One thing I will say that I thought was really important is I think that, you know, at least for my generation, and I'm Gen X, you know, for a lot of us, the sort of traditional ways in which we become involved in the political system is the way we sort of look to young people and expect them to also be involved.

But what I was struck about in the conversation is that they're engaging in society in ways that are quite different, and making tremendous contributions that are often overlooked, because we have this particular lens that we use to to look at politics and political engagement.

And so a lot of the stuff they're doing on the internet, for example, a lot of the sort of organizing the sort of causes that they work on, I mean, they're engaged in in ways that we just don't always measure.

And I just wanted to quickly, you know, agree with, you know, John, and I'm a big proponent of the term limits.

I think that people stay far too long, that the political system needs to incentivize people to leave, and I think it will open up and create opportunities.

I will say, as a member of the, you know, Gen X committee, I'm a little saddened by the fact that we've been skipped over, and now we're talking about millennials and Z and everybody.

You're on of.

So, you know, I figure I won't get my chance.

Yeah.

Well, we just don't have the numbers.

But you know that not the millennials.

When people need more.

We need more people of a certain age to.

Run.

Yeah.

We lost.

We lost our chance, John.

We want we want more Gen Xers.

We want more people that are customers.

We sit next to this millennial, right?

Yeah.

He's running things.

We know that.

Exactly.

Oh, for a second, Farrah told me earlier, that she wants my seats.

I'll be seeing you guys.

I'll be seeing you guys.

Maybe in Cabo these days.

It's Farrah.

Suede is going to take over.

And she should.

She was absolutely terrific.

And mercy, as well was, she'll be looking for work soon, so, please give these folks a call, and potentially you could hire them.

Any advice for those students?

Maybe not just, on getting employment, but for students that want to meaningfully engage with their peers.

Yeah, well, I'll go first real quickly.

They are already doing that.

I mean, I think the two of them coming and being on this show and having this opportunity, speaking.

So it's just it's just an amazing thing.

And and again, I keep coming back to it's not something I'm confident that I would have been able to do at that age.

And so clearly they're on a path or trajectory, you know, towards success.

I share Jonathan's idea that these are potential grad students.

Oh, there's PhDs and professors in the future.

Other students not in the poly sci program.

I because I think they made that distinction.

It's like, hey, we're involved.

We're engaged, we're having these conversations.

What about people that are sort of outside that bubble at UHart or southern Connecticut state or wherever?

Oh, I. Of that firsthand.

Because obviously it's no secret of in the sociology department.

And obviously you had a sociology major there from from UHartbroke But, I see that, where in many spaces and majors they don't want to, like, go directly to public office.

Maybe they want to make an impact at the government level, you know, through agencies, that they can work with or NGOs, you know, non-governmental organizations and certainly nonprofits.

So there is that interest, that that zeal that they want to go out there and demonstrate their chops.

But I will say to your point, Frankie, it's going to require a lot more, we need more people to step up and variety and capacities.

We need a lot more people to recognize that, you know, what exists at the community level is just as fundamental as it is the national or international levels, too.

So I don't know whether that is a pathway to address maybe more, the education dynamics in the classroom in terms of what's being taught.

Maybe in high school, for example, before they get to college, or maybe, consideration of emphasizing that, look, these spaces and places exist in the media market, in the media places exists in social media.

It's everywhere.

So how do we get that out there below?

Last question.

I'm going to give it to you.

I want you to do this as quick as you can.

Last time you were on here with, Jonathan and we talked to students.

We talked about having the students listen to one another, and there was some great advice you gave in that show.

Help us understand how you can push in class to make these kids debate each other.

But do it respectfully.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, ultimately, I can't put my thumb on the scale as a professor.

So I have to be neutral.

And but what I try to do is I try to create the space and create that opportunity for students to you engage in that conversation.

I think some of it really depends on the kind of questions you ask in the way in which you invite, but I think it is a process.

It's something we build over time.

You can't walk into day one and think you're going to get that.

But I think as the students become more confident, that you allow them to say things that you don't, you know, ridicule them, that you don't make fun of them, that you don't sort of, you know, push back at them really hard.

But to really challenge them, to think critically and to really, be able to provide some justification and explanation for the things that they're for, the points they're making.

And I think you create that space and over time they become comfortable with it.

It looks like you guys are doing well at the University of Hartford.

When we get to meet those students, in Mercy and Fair, they did a phenomenal job today.

And I'm sure Jonathan's doing a great job.

Of course he is.

Jonathan, we didn't forget about you.

Me?

They're teaching me.

That's the beauty of this generation.

They're teaching me.

I mean, I'm teaching identity politics this semester and I had it last night.

They're always reframing and offering new perspectives.

That's the beauty of being in the classroom.

That's Jonathan Wharton, associate professor of political science and urban affairs at Southern Connecticut State University.

Thank you so much for coming on the show today, Jonathan.

Thank you.

I can't wait to see you in person again soon.

We'll all associate professor of Politics and government at the University of Hartford, thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you.

Thank you for helping us out with this conversation.

It was great to have these guys on the show.

It's been even better to work with a friend of mine, hopefully a long term friend.

She's another student at the University of Hartford, Tali Ricketts.

And this was her last show, helping us out here.

She's been helping while Chloe Wynn's been away.

Chloe winds coming back soon.

So I just wanted to formally say thank you so much to Tol.

One of the law students.

He helped, connect us to Tali there.

You see her on your screen and happy birthday to Tali as well.

Thank you so much, Tali, for everything you've done.

We love you.

We appreciate you.

And good luck at your lacrosse game.

What a talented person.

All, all the things going on.

Shows edited by Patrick Scahill, Dylan Reyes, a technical producer.

Special thanks to test cerebral Meghan Fitzgerald, Connecticut Public Visuals team.

Download the Wheelhouse anytime on your favorite podcast app.

I'm Frankie Graziano.

This is the Wheelhouse.

Our show is over, but we do have one more opportunity for you to show some support to Connecticut Public this hour.

Here are two of my colleagues with more information on how you all can donate.

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