[COMM-ORG] query: are more students interested in community organizing?

[Discussion list for COMM-ORG]

[ed: please feel welcomed to copy COMM-ORG with replies to Peter's query.]

From: "Peter Dreier" <dreier at oxy.edu>


Colleagues:



I have a question for those of you who teach undergraduate courses in 
Community Organizing: Is interest in your classes – or in community 
organizing more generally – increasing among students on your campuses? 
I hope you will respond quickly to this question. Here’s why:



A New York Times reporter is writing a story about this phenomenon. Her 
thesis -- which I agree with (and even wrote a few articles about last 
year (http://dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=1215; 
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080929/dreier) -- is that the Obama 
campaign, and his presidency, has not only heightened awareness of 
community organizing as a job/career/vocation, but accelerated the trend 
of student activists looking for work as organizers upon graduation. 
This was happening BEFORE the Obama campaign (ie the campus 
anti-sweatshop and campus living wage movements began in the late 
1990s), but I think his campaign (which put heavy emphasis on recruiting 
young people and training volunteers as organizers,) accelerated it. 
Plus, any progressive movement requires a sense of hope and possibility, 
and I think Obama’s campaign and election provided some of that. Groups 
like Wellstone Action, Campus Progress (an offshoot of the Center for 
American Progress), United Students Against Sweatshops, the AFL-CIO’s 
Organizing Institute, and other groups that recruited and trained 
students also contributed to this.



I teach a Community Organizing course every fall, which includes an 
internship with a community organizing group, a labor union, an 
environmental group, or another group that does organizing work. I 
usually have 20-25 students. Already, 42 students have registered for my 
course for next fall. I don’t think this is because I’ve all-of-a-sudden 
become a more popular professor. I think it has to do with the political 
climate, Obama, the growing visibility of organizing (not only because 
of Obama, but also because of the Palin/McCain attacks on organizers 
that triggered a huge backlash). 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-dreier/palin-attacks-on-communit_b_129568.html



My friends who work for unions, ACORN, PICO, IAF, and other organizing 
groups tell me that they are getting more and more applicants for jobs 
and internships. I think this is all part of the same phenomenon.



Are you seeing the same trend on your campus? Please let us all know. I 
can relay that to the NY Times reporter, who is doing the story for next 
week, so please respond ASAP.



Thanks.



Peter

____________________

Peter Dreier

E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics

Director, Urban & Environmental Policy Program

Occidental College

Los Angeles, CA 90041

Phone: (323) 259-2913

Email: dreier at oxy.edu

Website: http://employees.oxy.edu/dreier



"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great 
moral crises maintain their neutrality" - Dante