It’s hard to imagine a time when there has been more attention paid to the federal budget than in the past several years.
When my students have to do a media analysis of coverage of the budget, it’s an embarrassment of riches these days.
But I find, for my students, that sometimes this familiarity can breed contempt.
When they learn that, in 2009, for the first time every dollar of revenue was committed for past promises–entitlements–it can be hard to message around why their advocacy is imperative.
When they question whether any crisis is sufficient to prompt leadership in today’s budget battles, I worry that they will cringe and turn away.
When I explain rules like Pay As You Go (PAYGO), I worry that, instead of committed to learning more about how to navigate the constraints in order to be effective advocates, they will toss up their hands in disgust.
In the fall semester, I teach a survey of social policy. For the most part, my energies are focused on helping students untangle what they thought they knew about the social policy landscape in which we live–and our clients struggle–and helping them articulate alternatives that could bring better outcomes.
And, now, in the spring, I teach advocacy practice.
For the first time, I’m finding it harder.
My students who are ‘coming of age’ (of any chronological age) in this particular climate are at risk, I fear, of tuning out, in a way that I couldn’t imagine just a few years ago.
It’s not that the policy climate is any more adverse than it was then; we cannot let ourselves be lulled into complacency by imagining that this is any worse than a time when ketchup was declared a vegetable for school lunches, or certainly when long lines formed for free meals.
It’s the process that concerns me, and my students’ difficulty in visioning a role for themselves within it.
Because their voices are needed, of course, now more than ever.
I consider it, then, one of my most sacred duties, to keep them from abandoning these fights.
What sustains you, as an advocate, and gives you enough hope to continue to engage? What should be my approach to cultivating that same engagement among my students?
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Classroom to Capitol 
Review Week: Red Ink
It’s hard to imagine a time when there has been more attention paid to the federal budget than in the past several years.
When my students have to do a media analysis of coverage of the budget, it’s an embarrassment of riches these days.
But I find, for my students, that sometimes this familiarity can breed contempt.
When they learn that, in 2009, for the first time every dollar of revenue was committed for past promises–entitlements–it can be hard to message around why their advocacy is imperative.
When they question whether any crisis is sufficient to prompt leadership in today’s budget battles, I worry that they will cringe and turn away.
When I explain rules like Pay As You Go (PAYGO), I worry that, instead of committed to learning more about how to navigate the constraints in order to be effective advocates, they will toss up their hands in disgust.
In the fall semester, I teach a survey of social policy. For the most part, my energies are focused on helping students untangle what they thought they knew about the social policy landscape in which we live–and our clients struggle–and helping them articulate alternatives that could bring better outcomes.
And, now, in the spring, I teach advocacy practice.
For the first time, I’m finding it harder.
My students who are ‘coming of age’ (of any chronological age) in this particular climate are at risk, I fear, of tuning out, in a way that I couldn’t imagine just a few years ago.
It’s not that the policy climate is any more adverse than it was then; we cannot let ourselves be lulled into complacency by imagining that this is any worse than a time when ketchup was declared a vegetable for school lunches, or certainly when long lines formed for free meals.
It’s the process that concerns me, and my students’ difficulty in visioning a role for themselves within it.
Because their voices are needed, of course, now more than ever.
I consider it, then, one of my most sacred duties, to keep them from abandoning these fights.
What sustains you, as an advocate, and gives you enough hope to continue to engage? What should be my approach to cultivating that same engagement among my students?
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