In the past three presidential elections, approximately 50 percent of young adults aged 18-25 voted. Half- only half- of the young minds in our nation voiced their opinion on who would be put in a position to change our lives. Why is that? Why do so few young adults exercise their 1st amendment rights?

The problem begins in our schools with many high school students trying to feel “mature” by attempting to talk about politics with their fellow students. This is good. They are showing interest in the politics of their nation. Unfortunately, those conversations aren’t very good because too many students are uneducated on what is going on in our world. This leads to conversations that don’t help push students to care about politics. Instead, these uninformed conversations lead to a dislike for politics and students that simply don’t care about what’s going on in the world.

Often when students talk about such things, they only look at one side of the story. They don’t seem to understand that there are always two sides to the story. You can’t have a mature conversation about politics without knowing both of those sides. Even if you don’t agree, you should always look at all sides of a problem. It’s ignorant to think that you’re right, and they’re wrong, and that’s that.

It wouldn’t take more than a quick look through current events to begin to understand what is going on in our world. And, a slightly more in-depth look will allow students to create their own opinions on such things. Without much work, students can completely abolish uneducated, uninformed, unscholarly conversations.

However, it’s not just up to students to fix their approach to politics. Parents are such a big part of what shapes a high school student’s views on politics. If a parent doesn’t care, their kids often won’t care either. If parents refuse to be open-minded about politics, that’s what they’re teaching the young minds of their high schoolers to do too. In some cases, parents don’t do it on purpose; they talk about politics around their kids, which is good, but then they don’t teach their children the importance of making their own decisions about their opinions on the government.

Thoughtful, healthy conversations among fellow students, or between a high schooler and their parents, are very important for the development of our nation’s young adults. Teaching high schoolers to view a problem from all sides and to make their own decisions instead of just repeating what they hear their parents say is extremely important.

In five years, our current high schoolers will be in that young voting range. The kids that aren’t getting all the facts- the students that aren’t looking at every side of an argument- those are the kids that will be voting to determine the future of our world. But they don’t have to be. With a little work, young adults can be shown the importance of having a voice and using that voice to help change the world.