The University’s Center for Politics hosted their 19th annual Virginia Political History Project. This year’s theme was “Happy 100th Birthday JFK.” About 160 kids from the local YMCA and Boys and Girls Clubs attended the event.
The Center set up a variety of activities for kids — including an obstacle course, storytelling and tie dye — to learn about former president John F. Kennedy and events that happened during his administration. The theme follows the Center for Politics’ yearlong JFK100 program, designed to celebrate the 100th birthday of the 35th U.S. president.
“So there's a quote from JFK at each one of our activities,” Glenn Crossman, director of programs for the Center for Politics, said. “We have a storytelling activity where they're being told the life story of JFK and then they're being given a 2017 Kennedy half dollar. The tie dye is about diversity. And then we have the space race which were doing balloon rocket races and there learning about how the space race began.”
Meg Heubeck, the director of instruction for the Youth Leadership Initiative, said the Center is trying to increase civic engagement among students through its programming, including the Virginia Political History Project.
“At the very least, that history can be fun,” Heubeck said. “Two, that college is an opportunity, because we're here at U.Va. That it's something that all of them have the ability to aspire to, and that also that you need to be active as a citizen, which is why all of the things we're doing, we're not sitting down and getting lectured. They are actually doing things.”
Heubeck also ran the tie dye activity about diversity.
“What we're trying to do today is we're celebrating the hundredth birthday of John F. Kennedy by looking at some of the legacies that he left to both American history but also to American civics,” Heubeck said. “In my station, it’s about diversity. So we’re talking Peace Corps, we’re talking about the Civil Rights Movement, we’re talking about all those things that are taking place in his administration to try to get students to think that history and civics go together.”
This is the 19th year the Center for Politics has hosted this event, but it has not always been a program for children.
“About five years ago we switched,” Crossman said. “For a long, long time it used to be a three-day conference, and we would do a documentary and then have a three-day conference in Richmond about a past Virginia governor. We caught up on all the governors so then we decided to switch this over.”
The switch oriented the program more towards children and changed the theme of programming from learning about Virginia’s governors to a new theme each year. Last year, the program was called Kid Power, and it was about how children can make a difference in their communities. The year before was about Virginia historical figures such as Henry “Box” Brown and Elizabeth Keckley.
The Virginia Political History Project is one of the Center’s events that focuses on promoting their Youth Leadership Initiative. The Youth Leadership Initiative is a program from the Center for Politics that promotes civic engagement in students.
“Our mission is to increase civic engagement,” Heubeck said. “The Youth Leadership Initiative does that by providing teachers with the very best civics resources for K through 12 students … So we're really pushing helping people to get along better, to talk about politics, not think it’s dirty or gross, so our government can work better, be more efficient.”
The Center for Politics was founded in 1998 by Larry Sabato as a way to promote politics and the importance of civic engagement. The Center sponsors a variety of educational programs and events, including the Virginia Political History Project.
“This is probably the staff's favorite event to do every year,” Crossman said. “It’s really fun to see the children learning and having a good time, and that's a big key with Professor Sabato is he feels like when students are entertained they're learning and they actually retain the information. That's a big part of today.”
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