YVote Peer Workshops

YVoters love facilitating workshops for peers–invite us to come get young people you work and learn with to be deVOTEd to voting. We have a number of workshops on tap–and are happy to customize others to meet your needs. Contact Sanda at [email protected]g if you’re interested in booking a workshop.

Here are some options:

Workshop I: Why Vote: How You Can Make a Difference At and Beyond the Ballot Box
Description: YVoters will share perspectives on “WHY vote” through the lens of vital issues of our time and HOW young people’s votes can transform the political landscape. Interested groups can indicate in advance which issue or issues you’d like to focus on: Climate, Criminal, Gender, LGBTQ+, Immigration, or Racial Justice

Workshop II: Vote–By Design

Description: While voting was in vogue leading up to the 2020 Election, young people often don’t have a framework to think through the factors that go into political decision making. Teens from YVote are available to facilitate interactive, digital Vote By Design Workshops, exploring an innovative framework for helping students think about who we vote for and why. Rooted in behavioral neuroscience, the Vote by Design nonpartisan process helps participants get clear on values, wrestle with biases, and check assumptions to make more informed decisions at the polls.

Workshop III: Issue Based workshops on Climate, Criminal, Gender & LGBTQ+, Immigration, Mental Health, and Racial Justice

Description: This summer, youth from YVote’s Summer ChangeMakers Institute worked in Action Groups—climate, criminal, gender & LGBTQ, immigration, mental health, and racial justice—to create lively 45-60 min Zoom-based, interactive workshops to educate middle- and high-schoolers about pressing social issues, why they matter, and what they can do to create positive civic change, including voting and being involved in electoral politics. Check out their workshops below and contact [email protected] if you’d like to set up a workshop–we can try to customize for optimal availability.

Here are some workshops we facilitated over the 2020-21 school year:

  • Kekeli and Kenisha enlightened peers about What To Think About For the Municipal Elections as part of a livestream hosted by NYCVotes and the Department of Youth and Community Development
  • Ranked Choice Voting is new to New York this year and Madina went live with NYCVotes and the Department of Youth and Community Development to educate peers about it
  • Kekeli and Milena facilitated a workshop on Environmental Justice for student leaders in the Middle College National Consortium (MCNC)
  • Karla and Keyla facilitated a workshop on Participatory Budgeting for the Aviation High School Political Science Club
  • Kellen & Kenisha facilitated one of eight workshops for students across grades 9-12 at MESA Charter School as part of their #MESARocksTheVote Week:
  • Karla, Katrice, Kekeli, Maisha, and Milena served as panelists for Beyond Voting: Environmental Justice panel with Solar One’s K-12 Green Lab (Oct 28, 2020)
  • Yuleimy and Yessii served as panelists for an I Can’t Vote But You Can workshop for Usher’s New Look (Oct 29, 2020):
  • Two FANTASTIC Vote By Design workshops, for YouthBridge (Oct 22, 2020):

and for Civic Spirit (Oct 18, 2020):

  • Yessii served as a panelist sharing YVote’s Social Media work for a Digital Activism workshop with the Nassau Youth Council (Oct 26, 2020)
  • Anna, Bethany, Mia, Shahribonu, Yamile, and Yessii loved facilitating Unleashing the Youth Wave in the Bronx for Bronx NW Indivisible and Lehman College (Oct 4, 2020)
  • Kenisha served as a panelist (the only one from High School) for a Generation Vote event following a screening of Rigged: The Voter Suppression Handbook (Oct 13, 2020)

YVote facilitator-led workshops

In Fall 2020, we initiated a series of knowledge-building workshops led by our peer-facilitators, now in college.

First up was Intro to Capitalism and Socialism, led by Saskia Van Horn (Oct 5, 2020)

Next up was The Right Side of the Aisle: What’s Up with Capitalism? led by Frank Yang (Nov 4, 2020)

Pre-COVID live workshops

  • Flashing back to the Before Times of COVID, we were honored the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center invited us to come speak with 135 of their SYEP youth during the very first week of summer programming. We thoroughly enjoyed it (and the Mt Sinai teens did very well in the Kahoot 🙂