Off the Track

In every high school around the country there are the political wonks. At McGehee, our students seem to believe that we have more of those political wonks than other schools. Especially with this being an election year, more students are paying attention and becoming involved in politics and the news. Rémy (’08) has always been up to date on the news and politics but this year she has really become interested.
We all grew up right in the middle of Bush’s presidency, which will most likely be remembered by the democrats as one of the worst presidencies in our country’s history. Despite the negativity of his two terms many students, like Rémy, have felt compelled to gain a deeper understanding of politics: “I think it’s very important to take advantage of the idea of democracy and to utilize our government’s transparency whenever possible… but because I witnessed Bush’s presidency from beginning to end, I’m more than aware that it’s critical now for us to elect a good leader.”
Even before this year Rémy had always been interested in politics and keeping up to date on it. From the scandals in Washington to the groundbreaking laws that Congress passes, she loves it all: “I love the fast pace of politics and the nitty-gritty ‘hardball’ stuff — and, yes, I do love to indulge myself with the latest political drama. Monica Lewinsky? Classic. All the remarks between Clinton and Obama really amuse me. But on a deeper level, I’m interested in politics because it’s such a fundamental part of our day-to-day life. We often don’t realize that our government is so powerful.” Unlike many students in high school, Rémy understands that even though the whole system in Washington is so much bigger than us individually, it is still important for us to be knowledgeable on politics and the people in it: “Political awareness is crucial to any constituent if we are to knowledgeably elect leaders. The representatives we elect control so much of our lives- taxes, regulations, driving age, education, etc.- so to be ignorant is essentially to be apathetic about your rights as a citizen.”

Rémy has not just taken this upon herself to be involved in politics; she feels that our school is more politically savvy than most schools: “The fact that we’ve paid so much attention to news, politics, and the government today in Ms. Thompson’s class has helped me and many others, I think, to be in tune with everything that’s going on in Washington. Most other schools don’t incorporate current events into their curricula, at least not as much as we do here.” She also attributes our political awareness to the fact that it’s cool to be outspoken here.
Rémy cannot vote this year, but that is not keeping her from getting involved in the election. She is working for Hilary Clinton’s presidential campaign through an organization called One in a MHillion: “It’s a feminist movement that aims to mobilize younger voters by asking women to donate $100 and to get ten friends to do the same. To make things equal, the men who donate have to donate $129.87 because on average, women still earn $0.77 cents to the man’s dollar.” Even through Rémy can’t vote, that isn’t stopping her from getting out and spreading the word: “So I’ve been working with 1/1MH. I’m also just talking a lot about the election to anyone who will listen- I believe that word of mouth is one of the best tools you can use in an election like this.”