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Interview: Fayneese Miller Other Articles in this Issue: Director's Welcome Interview: Fayneese Miller Conference Overview: "Fostering Youth's Civic Engagement and Participation in Free and Democratic Societies" Recommended Readings "Big ads, big money, and high public scandal" encompass the political experience of today's youth." Elizabeth Hollander Campus Compact, Brown University

Fayneese Miller, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Education and Human Development at Brown University received her doctorate from Texas Christian University and specializes in the areas of Psychosocial Development of Adolescents, Adolescents' Pro-social Attitudes and Behavior, and Social Adaptation Processes of Minority Adolescents. Fayneese's research examines the way in which young people think about and perceive the world in which they live. Specifically, in how notions about identity and race influence perceptions about place (alienation vs. social integration) and future (hope) for young people of color. Her work addresses the social/political attitudes and behavior among adolescents and the implications of cross-racial friendships for race relations among American and South African youth. She has written numerous articles for American Behavioral Scientist about the status, attitudes, and meaning of affirmative action in the 21st century and has most recently completed a book for Guilford Press entitled, Alienation and Hopelessness among Minority Adolescents. Fayneese teaches The Psychology of Teaching; Emotions, Cognition, and Education; Adolescent Psychology, and The Psychology of Race, Class and Gender. She lives with her husband and son in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Q: What are the most striking similarities or differences you noted in the behavior of the inner city children you studied and that of youth described by other attendees at the conference held here this summer to examine youth civic and political participation globally? A: Though the conference did not deal specifically with youth of color, it became very clear that, the degree to which youth feel connected to society differs across racial lines. Young people are not voting in large or significant numbers regardless of their racial, ethnic, or class background. However, when we break these figures down by race and ethnicity, we are finding that young kids of color are less likely to vote than white kids of the same class background. There is a difference across racial and ethnic lines in terms of the degree to which one participates. Q: What do you think causes this? A: Young people of color are not a part of the organizations that are purporting to make a difference in the lives of young people from a voter participation perspective. I think they are called on to provide input on an as-needed basis, but not included in any significant way. Q: What are some of the factors that determine political involvement? A: While we would like young people to be engaged in the political process, we also need to look at older people who are not engaged. If you look at the age group most engaged, it is usually the one that is close to retirement or retired. The other group actively involved is people who own their own homes. Young people are less likely to own homes. They are less likely to hold a job where they make a significant amount of money unless they are involved in technology or a dot-com enterprise. Young people who fall into this group, who are earning a lot of money at a young age, are becoming civic minded. It is almost as though economics and self-interest determines the extent to which one is involved in the political process. Q: Are young people's voting habits the same? Are Russian youth different from young people in Ireland, or different from the kids in the US? A: From a developmental perspective we are not seeing anything different in the youth of Russia, Ireland or the US. Young people are responding in the same way. They respond when there is an issue that pulls them in. This is standing up for their rights and new found freedoms in the Russian Republic, in Northern Ireland this focuses on religious issues. During the Reagan administration, here in the US, young people became politically active when getting jobs was a serious and difficult issue. Q: Youth everywhere want to be heard. They want to be listened to. Are gangs serving this need? Are they providing an empowering voice for young people? A: Gangs for the most part are dysfunctional--a dysfunctional family. Only specific members are really empowered--others are not. Also the current structure of gangs is not one that lends itself easily to political involvement, as its orientation is primarily one of self-interest. There are some gangs, very few however, that do empower youth in positive ways. I would not call them gangs because their purpose is quite different than the ones we have problems with. When we think of gangs, we think about those involved in illegal behavior ­ criminal and violent behavior. There are groups that look like gangs in terms of dressing alike, the colors they wear, but they are not gangs in the typical sense. They are community-organized groups that bring young people at-risk together very early on and engage them in positive activities. These young kids rap about something positive rather than something negative ­ they have adopted the language and the activities of some of the gangs, and put forth a positive image within the community. Q: Does adult involvement and leadership make a difference? A: Research does show that while young people are involved in peer group activities they still look to adults for direction and continued focus. Any group that is going to succeed has to have adults connected to it. Educational research shows that young people who are in groups with young people only, are less likely to advance at the same cognitive rate, than those who are involved in groups where adults have a role. Even if the role is to come in, raise questions and then step back out. Any adult presence gives the group the leadership and support it needs and makes it much more likely to function, succeed, and last. Q: Do politicians have a role to play? A: For the most part youth don't see politicians as being sincere. This is one of the major problems we have with getting young people involved. Think about it. Politicians go into the inner city right before an election. Other than that, they are rarely there and young people are very much aware of that. They don't think they matter to politicians. They don't think politicians are speaking their language or addressing their issues. When politicians do address their issues, many of these kids feel it as a threat to their independence and culture. I don't think politicians in the long run, would be the ones to get young people involved. There have been some exceptions such as Jesse Jackson who put together the Rainbow Coalition, which was made up primarily of young people. This was very successful in that he registered a large number of young people who went to the polls and voted. We know when there is an active movement to register young people what can happen. Jesse Jackson also spoke their language and understood their issues. I don't think that young people, for the most part, see that today. Now, lets back up even beyond the voters and look at the treatment of young politicians. The probability that a young person would get elected to an office is not very high. For example, in our recent election, Angel Tavares, a very young person, ran for political office and received 12% of the vote, which was a very good showing. Had he been a more experienced politician and older, he probably would have had a better showing. We want our youth to be involved, to participate, but we don't necessarily support or vote for them. Q: Young people do need to see other young people succeeding in politics but that does require funding. A: Yes, absolutely. It does come down to an issue of money. Whoever has the most money will be able to spread their messages the farthest. There are very few young politician role models. Young people, for the most part, do not have the money to mount such a campaign. Patrick Kennedy was an exception. He had both the name and the money behind him to be able to do it. Ideally we would love to see more young people involved. Those of us in psychology, in research, in education or involved in community organizations, understand the benefits for youth in terms of healthier human development. The reality of the matter, however, is that society does not support the involvement of young people. Until we change the ways in which we encourage involvement, we are not going to see a huge voter turnout. I am not so sure we really want to change this situation. I think the rhetoric is that we want young people to be involved, but I am not so sure we do. If they were more involved it would change the leadership substantially. It would have a huge impact on those people who are already in powerful positions. Q: The number of young people who are engaged in civic activities is higher than it has ever been. So while they might not be voting, they are actively involved in civic activities. Why is this? A: Young people are involved in community service because it increases the probability that they will get into college or into the college they want to attend. Colleges look at extracurricular participation in all areas, not just sports. Some schools also require community service before graduation. Service learning programs also exist in some schools. In these, young people connect what they are doing in the classroom to some activity that occurs outside the classroom. You have young people who are planning community gardens and then going into class and talking about the vegetables they have planted. They are doing something for the community. You have kids who are involved in churches and are going to an elderly worshippers house and making sure their lawn is cut. So the answer to your question is yes, young people are more involved but for a good number of them, the involvement is mandated by schools. What they are not involved in, is political activity. Q: There was a time when this civic activity led to political activity. This does not seem to be the case anymore. Can you talk about this a little? A: Young people are thinking about politics, but as you said, becoming a politician means you must have a solid economic base. A significant number of young people do not have that solid economic base. However, there are people in their thirties and forties that do have a solid economic base and are not moving in this direction either. You find it is very hard to get people to run for office. I think there is a certain degree of alienation that exists there. On one hand, we say to them, "You are an adult when you reach 18 you can now vote. You can go off to war". On the other hand, we say to them, "Oh no, you are not an adult after all". I think they are getting mixed messages and are not quite sure where they fall. I think that if we encourage adult perspectives, we might see young people seeing themselves as adults rather than seeing themselves as older adolescents. Late adolescence extends to about 25 or until the young person leaves their parent's home. We have to look at what societal trends have occurred that might be delaying participation in the political process. Certainly understanding the demands of political life, having role models and encouragement at home, as well as the fear of being scrutinized all play an important part. Q: What are the kinds of things we need to do? A: I think we should start encouraging political activity at an early age. There is no reason why young kids cannot be voting in school affairs. A few years ago I was called by Seasame Street to consult with them on a program they were doing on voter participation. One of the things we did was to have the characters go and vote, so the kids could see them voting. I think that if we have young people experience what it means to vote, they will begin to see and understand its significance. There was a time when candidates would go into the schools and share information about the issues with students. Schools also had mock elections. Today, students elect class presidents. Those who show leadership qualities can experience some of what it means to lead and to have responsibilities for making decisions. These are important steps in feeling empowered, which in turn leads to healthy human development. We need more civic education in schools, more activities where you can learn about the civic process and about how government works. In the past there were government classes. Courses were not just in American History, they also covered the government and how it operated. I think we have to go back to being very deliberate about helping young people understand the political process. The other thing we have to do is to help young people understand that they matter. Young people don't do well or engage in social activities as often as they could because they sometimes feel as though they don't matter to parents, teachers, or the community outside their community. I also think adults have to be role models. When we say we want young people to vote, we ourselves have to vote. And we have to be willing to take risks and run for office on local and school levels. We also have to have businesses become involved in the whole process. People are feeling they have got to work and make money and can't be involved in politics. Businesses have to become partners with those organizations that are trying to engage people politically. Q: So how can the political process encourage young people to vote? A: Politicians must speak their language, go to where young people are and address their issues: jobs, education, tuition, and security. They have to address it more than just around election time. We have to get young people to think of themselves as amateur politicians. This is a developmental process. Q: Who has the answers? Is it educators, politicians, families? Is it everyone together, or is there one group that must take the lead? A: I think families initially have to take the first step in getting young people to see the importance of being a part of the political process. Then, yes, when they go to school, teachers should pick up the task. I don't think we should ever expect educators to be responsible for the overall development of our child. Educators are partners in the process, they should not be expected to do it alone. Right now, we expect a lot of educators. We expect them to be parents, teachers, and moral role models in every sense of the word. I think teaching kids about the political process is as much a parental responsibility as it is an educator's responsibility. We all have to help our young people develop the core values they need in order to be productive and sharing members of society. Q: Caring about others is important for young people, not only for healthy development and a sense of well being, but also for politics. However, we have alarming rates of alienation amongst young people today. This can have deadly consequences as we have seen with Columbine and other schools. How do we work to address that? A: Alienation exists in all young people regardless of their economic background or the community in which they grow up. The difference is that for some young people, alienation and powerlessness is viewed as a stable phenomenon, or as a permanent condition. For others, it is temporary. So they tend to have hope. Alienation can be a normal part of development. It is not necessarily abnormal. There is nothing wrong with feeling alienated. It is how we respond to that young person's alienation that is very important. The response should focus on the individual and on the individual as part of society or various communities. Q: Parent engagement and support systems are key in providing hope are they not? A: That is right. Based on what I read about the Columbine situation, I suggest that the young boys who shot the other students had a stable form of alienation. You had young people who felt as though they didn't matter. You also had parents who were disengaged, who really weren't involved in their children's lives in significant ways. They did not know what was going on with their children. You had young people who did not have a positive peer network, which is also very important at all levels in school. When they get to middle school, they have to feel they have a network of friends around and they have to feel as though they are a part of something. That is very important. It is not that they will have no problems, they will. The important thing is that they have avenues by which they can solve those problems, address those problems. In every case where there is violence on a large scale, you have to look at the way those kids perceived themselves and their future. It is questionable whether or not they have a future orientation. Q: Young people's expectations influence the way they see things. Columbine kids had or felt they should have had power, while inner city kids don't expect to have power at all. Is that right? A: Yes, inner city kids attack people who are just as powerless as they are. Suburban kids, on the other hand, attack kids who are powerful or perceived as having some power that they may or may not have. For both groups of young people, however, someone is perceived as having something that the other wants and deserves. There is a real difference in terms of the focus of power. I would also argue that there is a difference between the hopelessness that exists in the inner city versus suburban environments. It is not just alienation, it is also hopelessness from feeling as though they don't really matter. This is what causes suicidal behavior. Young people at risk for suicide or who put themselves in risky situations have no hope for the future. None! So if we want to change patterns of political participation, we have got to change the way these young people view their lives. If you don't think you will live to adulthood, you are not going to be thinking about voting. There is another dimension to this, linked to a theory I have been developing while researching gangs. I discovered that there is a criminal hierarchy that exists within gangs and that if you are perceived as a gang member who can do something positive with your life and have a chance to make it academically, you are not allowed to engage in the gang's criminal activities. The gang members don't want you to get arrested. They protect you. They hold out hope for you. You are the member that is going to go on and make the rest of them proud. I began to rethink my psychosocial development model of social and political participation because of the gang finding. I now make the argument that there are kids who have a stable form of alienation and hopelessness for themselves, but not necessarily for others like them if they feel that the other persons will and can succeed. Q: Is there anything we haven't touched on that you feel would be important to mention? A: There is one thing that I think is important, while I understand and appreciate the importance of community service, I think service learning is a much more effective way of encouraging young people to become involved. Community service is something you do for other people. You don't see the connection to yourself. It allows you to put yourself on a pedestal and feel good about yourself. Service learning, on the other hand, helps you to understand the roles that you play and how what you are doing connects to what you are learning in the classroom, the science arena, the english arena, or the history arena. The connection to you is clearer and much more likely to have long-term consequences. We also need to have more school-related service work. Most of the service students do, takes them outside the school. Why not have service learning be school related so that young people can learn to take pride in the environment in which they find themselves? Why not connect service to learning so young people can connect it back to themselves and not see service as something that is outside of them and their lives. I have found in my research, that when people internalize what it is they do and can own it, they are much more likely to continue to be or become involved later in their lives. I think we have to have young people own involvement. Right now, I don't think we have moved them to the process where they understand the reasons and need for involvement, especially their own. We have to include them in more of what we are doing if we expect them to develop the skills they need to do what we want them to do. Voting isn't something that you just go in and do. It is a learned activity, which means that there is a certain degree of knowledge involved. If we want kids to be politically involved, we have to focus on them and help them understand the whole political process. They don't know enough about it. Are you going to put yourself in a situation where you need to talk about something you know nothing about? Let's say that someone asks you to give a talk on cloning. If that is your field, you will feel very comfortable giving a talk about cloning. If it is not your field, you will not put yourself in that situation and make a fool of yourself. You won't do it. You don't have the knowledge. Why are we expecting young people to put themselves in a situation when they have no knowledge of what it means to be involved in the process. They have no knowledge of what it means to vote. When we talk about involvement, we are ultimately talking about voting behavior. We know they are engaged in civic activities, we know they are engaged in community activities. They are not engaged in political activities. That is the difference. I think if we want young people to do certain things, we have to provide the knowledge base to help them understand what it is they need to do in order to be able to do what we would like them to do. We have to give them the opportunity to learn, so they can then trust their knowledge and themselves. Q: How will we measure success? A: I think the only way that we can measure success is if indirect political participation increases at the same time that direct participation increases. Indirect political participation happens when young people cannot vote but engage in conversations about voting. The more you talk about it, the more you provide them with the opportunity to talk about it, and the more likely they are to become politically engaged. I think we need to provide opportunities for young people to become involved in conversations about politics. Q: How will we know when indirect political participation has increased? A: We will know when young people care about the world in which they live and feel as though they can make a difference. They will make a difference by being actively involved in every single level of politics. We will know when young people feel included rather than excluded, powerful rather than powerless. Their increased direct political activity will show us. Q: In closing, what do we want for young people today? A: We want people who are secure about who they are and their place or role within this thing we call a civic society because with security comes involvement. We want to instill in our young people the message that they are part of a civic society and with that comes certain moral, political, social, and economic obligations and responsibilities. They are part of something important, and are part of whatever process has occurred. They can make a difference. We want young people to know that their vote counts and that their presence matters.