The University of Florida election lab found that in 2024, 90 million Americans did not vote in the presidential election. States like Arkansas, Hawaii, and Oklahoma even saw turnout levels as low as 50%. My best friend was one of the 90 million Americans who did not vote.

There were two major activities I was excited to do when I turned 18, buy a lottery ticket and vote. Besides becoming an adult, most people associate the age of 18 with voting. It is the first time that they are allowed to actually be a part of the Democratic process. I grew up in a house where politics were mentioned, but it was not a main part of our lives. My parents always explained to me, though, the importance of voting once I turned 18.

I turned 18 last summer during a time of very high party polarization. I knew how important it was that I voted because my choices would lead to very different outcomes. I also realized it was incredibly important to have my vote in Pennsylvania since it is a swing state. I decided to register through absentee mail-in voting that would count towards my hometown county in Pennsylvania.

I thought that my friends’ parents had encouraged them to vote too. That was until about a week before the election. I was talking to my best friend from home on the phone about the Trump rally being held at the BJC. She casually mentioned that she planned on not voting at all. I was very surprised because she is a very well-educated and active person in many things. While she had valid concerns for both sides, I tried to explain that she should try and decide who she thought was the lesser of two evils.

Again, she said she was not going to vote. Her parents, who would most likely not have agreed with her decision, had not helped her register for an absentee or even vote in New York where her college is. I was upset, but I realized it was not entirely her fault.

Not many people around her had encouraged her to vote. Since politics is considered more of topic to avoid in conversations now, a lot of people are uneducated about the process. Most of us rely on our parents, but people like my best friend may not always get the full story that way.

Now that the presidency is in full swing, she has voiced concerns over some of the measures taken by the president. She is a part of multiple groups that could be affected, including the group of students who rely on financial aid to help cover the cost of their prestigious education.

I understand why she did not end up voting. It has, however, showed me the importance of voting and being a part of elections. People often think their one vote will not matter, but they all add up to a greater outcome. I believe it is vital to make sure people coming-of-age are able to understand voting and not feel how my best friend did after the election.

During my sophomore year of high school, I took AP U.S. Government. It was the first AP class I ever took, and I was super interested to see what it was like. On the first day, our teacher told us that we would have to do a civic engagement project to demonstrate our role in the community. It could be anything from attending school board meetings to working with a politician.

I went home that night and asked my mom what she thought. She brought up that she knew someone running for a local judge position. At first I did not consider it because, as most high schoolers, I wanted to pick the easiest project. Working on a campaign was not that. I gave it some thought, though, and decided I would do it. I am interested in going into law, and this would give me the perfect first opportunity to see some of the process.

Later that month, I began working on the campaign. The election was in November, so I joined during the last stretch of campaigning in September.  The first thing I got to do was attend a volunteer meeting. A majority of people who work on a campaign are volunteers. We got our first assignment of the month which was canvassing. Canvassing is when volunteers go around door to door in neighborhoods and cities in order to ask people for their votes. We had a small flyer to give out as well. While it was definitely a little scary, I had a good experience. There were obviously many people who did not answer the door, but the people who did answer were very nice and interested. It was interesting to see how different people in the community felt on the issue.

A few weeks later, I got to attend another volunteer meeting where we discussed her competitor who was trying to attack her online with false information. The candidate I was helped, Mary Walsh Dempsey, stressed the importance of making sure voters have true information. She explained that some constituents lack a lot of educational understanding to tell the truth from fiction. She was worried many of them may vote for someone that would not actually help them at all.

We have all been told how important it is to vote and know what you are voting for, but this experience as a whole really opened my eyes to that value. The federal system we all rely on works solely because of public participation. It relies on people voting and even advocating or protesting against certain policies and politicians. I used to feel like votes did not always matter, but they do. Even if you are in the minority, it shows people that there is a minority and others that do not agree with them. I was really glad to be a part of a political organization that made sure all of their constituents had enough information to make a decision for themselves instead of a decision being made for them.

Volunteering was a big part of my high school experience. Like many other high schoolers, I normally needed community service hours for student council, honor society, or other organizations. Last year, I decided to volunteer at a soup kitchen run by a local church. They provide lunch to community members who can then sit in the banquet hall to have a nice, calming meal.

For a while, I associated the word soup kitchen with something offered to people who cannot afford a meal for themselves. I assumed that everyone who used them were people who absolutely needed to. This soup kitchen opened my eyes up to something completely different.

The first thing we did when we got there was help set up tables. We put plates and silverware on top of a placement. Every table had a nice tablecloth on top, so it looked as though a nice, formal event was being held. There were around ten to fifteen tables set up in the banquet hall. Each one had anywhere from seven to ten seats at each. Even though we are right outside of a larger city, our town is rather small. I was surprised to see how many people they were expecting to have. Were there really that many people struggling around me without anybody knowing?

We then tackled the food. There were church volunteers that had already placed most of the food out with the chefs. We helped unwrap desserts, though, and make sure everything looked like a buffet style meal. After this, it was just time to wait for the start.

People began to flutter in around noon. There was never a mass crowd; people came and left as they pleased. I helped serve food, and everyone who I talked to seemed grateful for my help. They all smiled and thanked us for putting together such a nice meal.

What I realize during this was that a lot of the people were not only people who relied on the soup kitchen for the meal. They were older people who attended the church and lived in neighborhoods around me. One mom brought all her five younger kids who did not have school.

It dawned on me that this soup kitchen was so much more than just a meal. It gave a mom a chance to take a break while her children played with the church’s toys and ate lunch. It gave some older people a chance to socialize and hang out without having to go out of their way. It gave people a chance to take a break and sit down for a meal. It gave soup kitchens a whole new meaning for me.

I felt crazy for having such narrow thinking about them at first. I am grateful for that soup kitchen, though, because it helped me broaden my perspective on different situations. I have always liked to volunteer, but I love to do it now because I know that a lot of what I am doing is helping everybody in my community, especially those who do not like to ask for help when they need it.

Ever since the summer of first grade, I have gone to summer camp. I spend eight weeks with my favorite people kayaking and hiking trails we are definitely not supposed to be on. I love camp; it is my home away from home.

The camp I go to, though, is run by the Jewish Community Center in our area. A lot of campers who go there, including me, are not actually Jewish. We just happen to live in the area with our parents who really loved the lake on the property. I did, however, have many friends that were Jewish and went to the JCC in our area too.

There was not much different at camp compared to one run by an after-school center. We all played dodgeball and swam in the pool until we got practically dragged out at the end of the day. Because of this, I never realized that some people really disliked camp and some of my Jewish friends who went there.

Then, one day, a security guard named Leigh arrived at camp. I did not understand why we needed Leigh until I heard about anti-semitic attacks. There had been an attack at a synagogue and threats of ones at other Jewish community places. They brought Leigh in to make sure nobody could try to hurt us.

I could not imagine anyone harming my friends. I wondered how people’s hearts could be so hateful and why they disliked my friends who are just like me. What upset me the most, though, was trying to understand the fear that some of my friends were feeling. I never felt scared to go to church, and it just did not seem fair to me.

I realized most of these cruel people barely even understood Judaism; they just despised it. My experience has been the complete opposite: thanks to camp, I’ve done everything I can to learn about Judaism even though I practice another religion. My best friend and I love to talk about our attempt at making challah and the interesting stories the Rabbi told us for Shabbat. Going to a Jewish camp has not hurt or warped me like some people think; it has actually changed me for the better. Camp has opened my eyes to different cultures and religions I would not otherwise know. It has taught me to be accepting and open-minded because although the people I first met at camp were different from me, they became some of my best friends.

Camp taught me a valuable lesson that I think many people who discriminate against others have never experienced. People begin to separate others around them into categories and out-groups when in reality they are very similar to us. My Jewish friends from camp looked like me and had the same interests as me. Obviously we practice different religions, but that never conflicted with our friendships. I think it is important for others to truly think about how similar they are to the people they choose to hate because when it comes down to it, everybody really is alike.

I measure my years in summers. I love the smell of chlorine and sunscreen, the feeling of wind on my sunburned face, and the sight of clouds peeking through pine trees. What I love most about summer, though, is being back at my home away from home, JCC Camp Daleville. It is actually where I learned what many of my civic values are as a person.

A summer camp is not somewhere where people expect to create their opinions on civic issues. However, when I was a 16-year-old first time counselor, I had an experience that forever changed my perspective on a very large civic issue.

I vividly remember talking to my friend about the new Ukrainian kids when my boss entered with two new campers. Artem had short brown hair and gripped his phone so hard I thought it might break. Mahdina had the most gorgeous blonde hair and ocean-blue eyes.
Artem and Mahdina were so scared at first, but as they acclimated to camp,they just seemed happier. To the other campers, they seemed like completely normal children. What they failed to realize, though, was that Artem and Mahdina were actually Ukranian refugees who spent months attempting to flee their country that had been attacked.

I remember sitting on one of our old, splintering picnic tables listening to this sweet 11-year-old boy talk about hiding in subway stations new to his little sister like it was a normal Tuesday activity. It absolutely broke my heart.

We struggled to communicate with them at first, but everyone greeted them with acceptance and warmth. I helped Artem improve his English through popsicles, dodgeball, and soccer. Mahdina
had to practically be pulled from the pool everyday. They seemed to be adjusting to their temporary new life here pretty well, but I could not get the ideas of what they had been through out of my head.

I love all of my campers deeply so knowing they had gone through so much at such a young age affected me. War is a complex and large problem, but people often do not recognize that it is also a civic issue.

There are hundreds of regular families and children like Artem and Mahdina who get caught in these political crossfires. Fortunately, with media being more widespread than ever, people have been able to become more vocal about the effects of war in other countries. Many people in safer places, like the United States, are able to use their power of civic engagement in order to advocate for these families.

Personally, this allowed me to not only see the deeper effects of wars, but also to realize the power I have here to shape my views and do something about it. I was able to spread the word about events that raised money for citizens in war-torn areas. I decided that people like Artem and Mahdina deserve someone to help them and advocate for them in a time when they are simply in survival mode. Their experience opened my eyes to a new perspective and new ways that I can use my civic power to help them.