>>> Hi, welcome to “Perspectives,” a new CUNY TV
Digital Series exploring political engagement at the
City University of New York.
I'm Michael Waxman, and I'm studying Political Science and
Media Studies at Hunter College.
In the days leading up to this year's midterm elections,
we wanted to document how CUNY students and faculty are
feeling about the issues that are directly affecting them
and their communities.
Let's take a look at what some of them have to say.
♪♪
>>> I remember having this conversation with somebody in
my theater class.
I was like, yeah, I remember last election how everyone's
talking about like Hillary Clinton and Trump and I'm just
like, yeah, but you know, there's other people going
like the Green Party, the Constitutional Party, the...
>>> The Working Families Party.
>>> The Working Families Party,
and she was like, there's more parties and I was like,
you didn't know?
>>> People that’s working in the government,
like as in Congress, like they need to be selected,
they need to be like investigated and selected
because the way that they’re running it is not fair and
it's a lot of corruption and it's a lot of stuff going on.
They take your money.
They not really doing what's right for us as Citizens and
it's not right.
>>> Like the corporations, they donate a lot of money to
the people being elected.
It’s almost like bribery and that's why it causes,
you know them to remain in power and whatever the
corporations want is what happens since they did,
you know, donate a whole lot of money to the
person being elected.
>>> My fear is that the country just going to grow
even more divided, that people are going to be so afraid of
the other, of the person on the other side of the aisle
that they're going to be drawn to the extreme on their side.
And that's just going to further divide our political
world where everybody's going to look more at each other,
more as adversaries rather than try to find the similarities.
>>> While some students are very involved in advocacy work
and speaking up about political issues,
other students are not.
And I think there are many reasons for that.
I think some students don't know they have what the
avenues are to do that.
I think for some students their lives are so hectic, right?
Our students at CUNY, they have families,
they work full time, they go to school.
So, they're just doing the motions to be the best they
can be and that's like another layer.
>>> My polling station is in Brooklyn.
I have to work, I have classes and the last couple of
elections I couldn't vote because of that accessibility.
So, I think parents who work, students who work,
we don't have I mean, if we can unlock our phones with our
finger, why can't we vote with our fingerprint?
>>> I, you know, work in a school in Brooklyn where we
are directly being affected by issues with charter schools
taking over our campus, like we have a charter school that
just came in, it has only a freshman class in the
sophomore class and I was already thanks to Cuomo has
access and the right to take like our entire,
you know, they took like a half of our floor this year.
So, I think just informing parents,
informing students something that we did in our school was,
we dedicated a lesson to explain why that is to our students.
>>> In my community, some of the things especially in the
local level would be real rent reform which has to do with
affordable housing here.
Gentrification is taking over quite a bit.
We saw it already in Manhattan and Inwood.
We're seeing it in Brooklyn and we're seeing it in parts
of Queens, but now it's kind of encroaching into areas like
Corona, Jackson Heights and so forth.
And that's displacing so many communities,
people who have actual roots in the community and it's just
all about real estate and more money and more development and
yet they don't allow for communities to continue to
thrive and grow.
>>> The only way we're going to make it better is if we
start paying more attention to politics in general.
We have to understand the whole system power works.
We have to understand how, who really cares and looks out
best for us.
We can't just look at the person and say,
you know what?
My vote is for this person because it seems similar to me.
You can't vote for the person because they
look like they're nice.
I'd vote for the person because what they want overall
for the state is going to help you and build on you.
>>> Well, there's quite a few organizations in Queens that
really help people get involved.
But I think what's most important is having,
I live in a district where we have strong young women;
Alexander Ocasio Cortez as well as Jessica Ramos who
actually went against all odds and really put out a campaign.
They canvassed, they walked the streets.
They actually got to meet the people which I think
re-energized overall how people think about voting and
it's important for people to see that they are that there's
people out there who actually care about them.
It's just not a party system.
It's an actual people who are running behind our issues and
are fighting for us.
>>> I think that it's time for us as educators to let go of
the idea that our work is not political.
Education is inherently political and I think the time
that we are living in the time that we are educating our
students and the times that they are living through it's
not easy and it's not enjoyable to talk to your
students about gun violence.
Are you obligated to do it?
Yes.
It's not easy to talk to your students about Trump's views
on immigration.
Do you have to do it?
Yes, because if you don't, you don't know who on Earth is
telling them that those things so,
I think that as teachers right now,
it's our responsibility to get out there and say okay,
you know what?
Maybe we weren't supposed to be political before but right
now for my safety for me as a young woman today teaching in
the New York City Department of Education, No!
I refuse to stay away from politics,
I refuse not to be political because it affects the safety
of me and the safety of my students,
and the safety of my community. 00:06:06.833,00:00:00.000 ♪♪