Driving change: Student leaders sharpen skills in political leadership
How the Democracy House is helping OHIO students turn their thought leadership into action
McKenna Christy '25 | February 23, 2024
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While younger people are to political participation, a group of 91探花 Student Senate leaders are already heavily engaged in civic leadership. These three students are gaining valuable training through Democracy House, an organization dedicated to driving 鈥渋nnovation in civic education and leadership, community infrastructure, public policy, and youth voter participation,鈥 according to the group鈥檚 .
Megan Handle 鈥24, the president of OHIO Student Senate, Chief of Staff Carson Sarver 鈥24, and OHIO alumna and former Women鈥檚 Affairs Commissioner Kennedy Huntsman BA 鈥23, are team members for the Democracy House鈥檚 Young Leaders Civic Action Program (YLCAP). YLCAP is an opportunity for students who completed the Young Leaders Summer Institute, a Democracy House internship, or received a partner nomination. The program trains students on leadership skills for civic engagement purposes and allows teams to develop projects to bring back to their universities that will benefit the student body.
From left, OHIO Student Senate leaders Carson Sarver 鈥24, Megan Handle 鈥24, and Kennedy Huntsman BA 鈥23 during a Senate advocacy trip to Washington, DC in 2023.
Before becoming part of YLCAP, Handle and Huntsman participated in Democracy House鈥檚 Young Leaders Summer Institute (YLSI). YLSI Fellows learn from experts about what threatens democracy through 鈥済lobal and historic democratic contexts.鈥 Fellows met for weekly two-hour virtual sessions and interacted with civic leaders and elected representatives. Sarver was able to join their team for the YLCAP because of Handle and Huntsman鈥檚 prior involvement with Democracy House.
The program provides students with the resources to 鈥渟trengthen democracy in their communities through organizing practices while developing their leadership skills.鈥 For Handle, Sarver, and Huntsman, the program began in January and will end in April. The team traveled to Austin, Texas, at the beginning of the year for in-person training.
鈥淥ur time in Austin was spent learning and working on how to organize groups of people and how to coach [and] be coached,鈥 Sarver explained. 鈥淭hrough our training, we learned about the ways in which people can organize groups of individuals to make a change as well as how we ourselves can organize on our campus.鈥
The skills they learned during the three-day training were meant to be brought back to OHIO to help others improve their leadership skills. From January to mid-April, the YLCAP cohort meets virtually twice each month and teams participate in weekly coaching meetings to track the progress being made for their projects.
鈥淲e are all incredibly excited to bring our project into fruition,鈥 Sarver said. 鈥淲e are working on adding Narcan, a medicine that can treat an overdose, into local bars on campus. We are hoping to educate more individuals on the benefits of having Narcan in local places as well as educate individuals on how [they] can help.鈥
Carson Sarver '24
Megan Handle '24
Kennedy Huntsman BA '25
By the end of the program in late April, the cohort will meet once more to celebrate each team鈥檚 accomplishments. The and applications are due no later than May 10.
鈥淭he Democracy House has helped us all grow as leaders as we have resources provided by the organization, we can use to help bring our project into fruition and to help be the best leaders [we] can be,鈥 Sarver said.