The Young Democrats of America is the youth sector of the Democratic Party and is the nation’s largest youth-led partisan political organization. At HC, the club is led by senior Caroline Elkinson and teacher Matthew Logsdon. The HC Young Democrats club currently has meetings every Tuesday, where they discuss current news and ways to promote liberal politics and active citizenship.
Elkinson is a senior and has been a part of Young Democrats for her entire high school career, this year becoming club president.
“My favorite part of the club is [when] we hear about the news,” Elkinson said. “Because every week we do a weekly kind of news summary. [Also] just kind of talking about politics, everyone is really engaged and you can tell that everybody cares and everybody wants to be there.”
The club pushes to be centered around advocacy for the community at HC.
“I would define it as a club that is centered around political advocacy and bringing young members of the community together to kind of serve as a collective to advocate for liberal politics.”
The club tackles many important issues and they have been particularly active recently, with it being an election year.
“We did post card writing for Amendment Two [to prevent it passing],” Elkinson said. “Which would’ve decreased funding for public schools. [Along with that] we did some phone making for Harris [to encourage voting].”
Previously, they’ve also utilized postcard writing to advocate for other issues.
“In the past we’ve done some phonemaking and postcard writing for trans rights, abortion rights, [and] anti [Trans-alaska] oil pipeline,” Elkinson said. “That’s just in my last two or three years that we’ve done that stuff.”
Currently the club has about twenty members and they are looking to expand. Being a part of Young Democrats provides members with different opportunities for political involvement and service.
“I joined because I felt like I wanted to make a difference and I wanted to participate in politics, but it felt like everything I would do on my own would be so small,” Elkinson said. “I felt like joining a collective was the best way to actually make a difference.”
Since this is her last year at HC, Elkinson would like to bring in people from clubs with similar ideas and principles.
“I would really like to get a hold of more members from clubs that have kind of similar values, like maybe the GoGreen club, the Civics club, or GSA,” Elkinson said. “Just people that are gonna have similar core values and outlooks on politics and try to bring them in.”
Besides bringing in students from other clubs, Elkinson and the other seniors hope to establish a foundation for the club to continue on in coming years.
“I would really like to establish a really good leadership for next year to make sure that the club doesn’t dissolve like it did my junior year,” Elkinson said. “So I’m really hoping to establish a strong leadership and a strong base of underclassmen members so that the club can keep going even after I graduate.”
If you are interested in joining the Young Democrats, you can find out more about them by their flyers posted throughout the school, or through their Instagram, @hchsyoungdems.
