The Round Table: A YVote Podcast

At this week's Round Table, Jack and Madeline spoke with Salomón Flamenco, a rising 2nd year Masters student at Georgetown University, whose work currently focuses around the experiences of minorities in America. Being Salvadoran American, Salomon experiences the lack of connection with his Spanish roots, which is a common thread amongst children of immigrants. He created his own podcast, Minority Reports with Salomon Flamenco, which covers the implications of living in a diaspora, and features individuals from many different backgrounds. 

We had a fantastic discussion of what it means to be biracial and bicultural in the United States, as I am. We run the risk of losing touch with both sides of our culture, or having labels put upon us that we can’t break out of in our own way. Letting go of preconceived notions and beliefs that have been instilled in us is the only way we can take control of how we look at ourselves and start to shift beliefs, which is very necessary as our country evolves to become a majority minority country.  

We also took an interesting dive into AI and the impact it may have at the intersection between culture and film. Salomon raised a few political concerns about AI running the risk of exploiting groups that have historically been exploited and having easy access to committing fraud. All in all, we concluded that AI technology will never replace human creativity BUT it will have widespread ramifications, some of which concern us. Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack, Kenisha, and Madeline spoke with Mondiant Dogon, human rights activist, refugee ambassador, and author of Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds. Mondiant is the founder of the international nonprofit organization, Mondiant Initiative, with a mission to transform the lives of refugees in Africa through opportunities.. His plan is to expand this initiative all over the world. 

Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mondiant discusses how his life experiences and the work he has done has impacted his life and empowered other refugees to aim for great things.  In his moving memoir, he describes his wide ranging experiences from surviving two genocides, being a child soldier, becoming a refugee in Rwanda and surviving on one meal over three days, and later moving to the United States to attend college at New York University with seemingly unlimited resources. Throughout this journey, he has learned the value of giving a voice to people who might not normally have one as well as valuing each refugee as an individual. Living amongst people with different backgrounds and experiences, he’s gotten the opportunity to learn that “once everybody realizes that we’re all human beings, the world will change.” Refugees should be seen as HUMANS and not a political problem or crisis. Mondiant has planted seeds of hope in the refugees he works with, inspiring them to make their own decisions and take control of their lives.

We closed with discussion of how we can empower refugees to shape their own futures despite the adverse set of circumstances they face. But first, they need to be seen and given a voice in order to have a chance at success. Mondiant deeply understands the power of simply listening and talking to refugees, as well as displaying empathy and love. Acknowledging and supporting refugees in any way you can is the very first and most vital step towards empowering them. 

The Mondiant Initiative is currently looking for volunteers for the organization to help refugees. If you are interested in helping to transform the lives of others, check out different ways to get involved today by heading to the website https://mondiantinitiative.org/get-involved/ Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack & Maya spoke with Daniel Jones, cultural curator at The Cameron Art Museum (CAM), whose work lies in the intersection of art, history, and education. As a curator, Jones collects oral histories and uses artistic expression to continue to push these stories to the forefront of our communities. The CAM is located in Wilmington, North Carolina–one of the last major campaigns of the Civil War and a major port town. 

As a place that has always been associated with the “lost cause” of the Civil War, the exhibit he’s curated at The CAM aims at telling a different story about the town and its inhabitants. Changing the narrative of Wilmington, while also instilling a sense of pride in the community that’s been here since the beginning, is extremely important to the mission of the museum. At The CAM, there’s more room to go in depth and talk about history that has often been concealed, bringing it to a variety of different age cohorts. The CAM is committed to fostering insightful conversations surrounding artifacts and history for museum-goers at young ages and ALL ages in order to understand human communities, prepare for real world obstacles, and interact with people who may not be like you. 

As we know, there has been a crack down on what can and can’t be taught in many classrooms in the South, leading to a true challenge in making sure full stories get told and shared. Amidst these constraints, we should ask ourselves,“What can we do to ensure that the history of marginalized communities don’t remain buried?” and “What will future generations of America look like if there are similar curriculum crackdowns in the North?” We need to empower all people to share their stories because that is a vital part of who we are. Museums like The CAM can play a valuable role in this. As Daniel Jones said, “We will never get the true human experience until you pull from whoever that story is affecting.” Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack, Kenisha, and Maya spoke with veteran educator Kent Lenci, author of Learning To Depolarize: Helping Students and Teachers Reach Across Lines of Disagreement. Kent framed for us that political polarization feels acute because of the negative connotation surrounding this concept. However, his goal is to help educators navigate the complexities of polarization in order to prepare today’s students to face tomorrow’s polarization. Through doing so, youth can be encouraged and supported in facing the challenges of working across lines of disagreement. 

We had lots of questions for him: What does polarization look like in educational settings? What WORKS in defusing polarization? What HELPS build bridges against lines of disagreement? We discussed our concerns that too often, education is being used as either a political weapon or a political tool rather than a system to serve people as the bipolar nature of our political divide has grown bigger and more intense. Too often, those who try to encourage viewpoint diversity and to reach out to people we disagree with are met with skepticism, mistrust, and pushback. In the face of threat, Kent noted that rational thinking becomes disabled as individuals develop a “fight-or-flight mechanism” fearing an attack on a crucial part of their identity. It doesn’t have to be this way! Kent inspired us to try to look at things and people in the most charitable light and to embrace perspectives all across the spectrum in relation to issues facing our world today. Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack, Kenisha, Madeline, Maya spoke with Drashti Brahmbhatt, Participatory Budgeting Project Management Director at the NYC Civic Engagement Commission. We were fortunate to have Drashti discuss The People's Money and its goals for bringing New York City one step closer in having everyone’s voices heard in government on the very day the campaign launched! The People's Money is NYC's FIRST citywide Participatory Budgeting process through which New Yorkers across the five boroughs have an opportunity to vote on how $5 million of the city’s budget should be spent on ideas in their communities. 

Drashti recognizes that people’s experiences with government in the countries they’ve immigrated from colors the ways in which they look at government. As a city of immigrants, she believes The People’s Money has the potential to influence their initial outlook on New York City’s government for the good. The power that comes with having a database of ideas created by, and funded by, New Yorkers is truly inspirational and can be what is needed to instill long lasting change to our city. The People’s Money campaign launched on May 10 and so far, people are really enjoying the concept of having the economic power to bring about growth and change in their communities.

Looking ahead into the future, we would love to see far more funding devoted to The People’s Money in order to ensure that all the prevalent issues in our city don’t go unnoticed and get addressed. One of the best things about The People’s Money is that anyone age 11 or older of any immigration status can participate and get involved in democracy in New York City. As such, there’s a path for the engagement of people who aren’t traditionally seen or heard when it comes to voting and civic participation, which is really exciting. Needless to say, young people are a vital target in this campaign and we are excited to engage as many young people as we can between now and when the campaign closes on June 25.  Please be sure to vote and encourage everyone you know to vote at on.nyc.gov/pb  Thank you for listening!

 At this week's Round Table, Erina, Kenisha, and Madeline spoke with AMAZING 16-year old DJ Yearwood who is the founder of Vote16 Missouri, a nonpartisan state-wide initiative to lower the voting age to 16. DJ believes that advocacy and grassroots work are some of the most important steps of the civic and political change process and voiced his concerns surrounding lack of youth representation in political processes, securing youth rights, and supporting youth leadership. 

DJ underscored that young people don’t lack the urge to participate politically— they often lack the *opportunity.* Youth are too often seen as inferior or even incompetent but he demonstrates that this should not stop us from being involved in decisions that affect our communities.. Everyone has the capacity to contribute and getting involved at any level— whether through advocacy, organizations, or even door knocking—can help address key civic issues. We need to move beyond performative activism. We should never be content with anyone ruling out an entire category of people. We need leadership at ALL levels. Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Kenisha and I spoke with Ivelisse Porroa-Garcia, a Democrat who serves as Senior Vice President at Crossroads Strategies, helping companies and organizations navigate the federal government in Washington, D.C., and Nic Adams, a Republican who is on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Although affiliated with two ideologically different political parties that experience strong tensions, Ivelisse and Nic talked openly and compellingly about how it is possible to find common ground to address issues in a bipartisanship fashion amidst the difficulties of doing so. cx

Ivelisse and Nic reinforced the message that seeking friendships with people who are different from ourselves is extremely important in a world where people have many different values and beliefs. Republicans and Democrats do not have to be enemies. Ultimately, we are all Americans and all want what is best for our country’s well-being. We should continue to approach issues as a team effort because everyone’s opinions and ideas are valid. If we see injustices, we should address them through shaping policy. Taking in different perspectives will lead to collective efforts that are

At this week's Round Table, Kenisha and Jack spoke with Dr. Aaron Mckain, executive director of The Institute for Digital Humanity, and students Philip Graham and Richard Leyva about how to navigate new emerging technology like Artificial Intelligence and how to use these technologies for good rather than letting them further polarize and antagonize our political process. The Institute for Digital Humanity is a multi-faith, human-focused, bipartisan, and student-run think tank based in downtown Minneapolis. They are passionate about  advocating for civil rights issues connected to advances in technology and to fighting against the improper use of algorithms. 

Dr. Mckain shared four main challenges that all of this digital technology presens to our lives: AI ethics and unreliability, filter bubbles and misinformation, hate speech vs. free speech, and privacy. With the rising prominence of ChatGPT, these brewing challenges are crystal clear. According to Dr. Mckain, ChatGPT is “a robot spitting out a bad book report.” As ChatGPT gets “smarter” and smarter—and becomes the coin of the realm—there is all sorts of scientific and ethical knowledge about the world that’s going to be misinterpreted, making it easier for injustices to be obscured from the news.

Looking ahead, our guests expressed concern about ChatGPT having a lasting negative impact on the younger generations. Youth may start to “humanize” this software, expecting it to satisfy core human needs that technology never will. This amplifies the value of centering our connections, communications, and relationships with other human beings. Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack, Kenisha, and Vanessa spoke with Betsy MacLean, the first Chief Engagement Officer of the City of New York. Betsy previously ran her own non-profit organization called Hester Street that sits at the intersection of communities and the government. From cultivating diverse relationships between staff to drastically increasing the national and international scale of their projects, Betsy played a crucial role in helping city agencies engage communities in ways that are inclusive, equitable, and accountable. She strongly believes in the need for communities to work very closely with the government, particularly low-income, marginalized communities that have been historically left out of the policy and decision-making process. This is an outgrowth of her work in East New York over many years, developing housing and directing broader community planning and development. From all of her insightful experiences, she talks about the inspiration she draws from communities working together to create something bigger than themselves, referring to this as a path to “collective liberation.”

Betsy shared why she loves her job: she strongly believes that “We have to have a government that works for us, that works with us, that is powered by us, because it is the entity that can make significant change at scale.” She recognizes that people often feel alienated when it comes to the government. A key issue that needs to be addressed is that there is no central hub for all of the city’s engagement work to be coordinated and no real opportunity for all city agencies to directly communicate with one another to address constraints being experienced by communities. 

Betsy spoke with us about how her work aims to address these ongoing issues in order to build city-wide civic trust and well-being. Getting agencies to promote open communication and collaboration with communities will not only result in better policies, but also lead to better outcomes and the closer connection between communities and government that is necessary for true democracy. We must get better at addressing the challenges that groups of individuals experience and blending all of these together to create inclusive, equitable, and effective solutions for our city. Thank you for listening!

At this week's Round Table, Jack & Madeline spoke with Michael Whidden and his 16 year old daughter Miranda Whidden, founders of American Tributaries. American Tributaries is dedicated to promoting experiential education travel within the United States for U.S. high schoolers through bridge-building itineraries. Their trips emphasize learning from and about fellow Americans in different regions and communities through on the ground face-to-face engagement. They extend to everyone – regardless of background, belief, profession or any other categorization – the four core virtues of civil civic engagement: curiosity, respect, compassion, and humility. 

While they explore many different aspects of history, tradition, and culture, the most prominent theme in their trips is food because of its connective nature.  Its distribution relies on interdependence between various regions, communities, and professions.  The collective experience of a meal in the same physical space promotes conversation, understanding, and fellowship. The Whiddens strive to cultivate the agile intellects and emotions which future leaders will need to navigate, manage, lead, and inspire the disparate people and communities of 21st century America to be able to better understand the world simultaneously through their own viewpoint and others’. 

We discussed what their experience was in putting together the inaugural trip to South Carolina last year; the bridging experiences they had on the trip, from engaging with a pro-Trump farmer in Charleston, with soldiers at an Army base in Columbia and with SC high school students in Greenville; how simply being curious projected (and invited) respect; and their concerns about the current emphasis in high school travel on overseas trips rather than domestic exploration. More broadly, we discussed how context influences how we prioritize our values and the power of applying the four core civic virtues unconditionally to build bridges and promote understanding–themes that are core to us at Next Gen.  Thank you for listening!