Students to Get Inside View of Mayor’s Race

Students from 45 Los Angeles high schools will take part in a six-month study designed to increase involvement in the 2001 mayoral election, officials for the Annenberg School for Communication said Friday.

Students will have opportunities to meet and interview candidates, participate in public forums, write op-ed essays and make video documentaries as part of the Los Angeles Student Voice program, which will be administered by the Annenberg school, which is located at USC. Each school will receive two computers that students can use to research political issues.

The teenagers will also be surveyed about their knowledge of the political process and events before and after the six-month study.

All six major mayoral candidates said Friday that they want to participate in the program.

Although many of the program participants will not be old enough to cast ballots in the April 10 primary election, school officials hope that interested students will eventually become consistent voters.

Participation by young voters has been falling steadily since the early 1970s, when roughly 50% of 18- to 24-year-olds cast ballots. Fewer than 20% in that group voted in the 1998 congressional elections, a recent survey by the National Assn. of Secretaries of State found. Most of those surveyed said they lacked information about the candidates and their positions on the issues.

“People who don’t become interested in politics in high school never do. Now is the best time to involve them,” said Thomas Hollihan, professor and associate dean for academic affairs at the Annenberg school.

The $450,000 program is part of a nationwide study being administered by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. The study has already been conducted in Philadelphia and should eventually take place at 22 cities over the next five years.