Students at the Polytechnic campus will have the opportunity to participate in a grass-roots effort to retain young leaders in Arizona next Monday at 4 p.m.
The Manifesto Project aims to host 50 events across the state and have 100 young leaders on boards serving the community by January. The project came about after the Center for the Future of Arizona, a think tank headed by former ASU President Lattie Coor, published “The Arizona We Want 2.0” report.
After journalism senior Mauro Whiteman and ASU alumna Courtney Klein Johnson, co-founders of the project, read the report, they decided to put it into action.
“One of the eight goals of the report was to make Arizona the place to be for young people," Whiteman said. "Both of us have seen in our personal lives that young people leave this state a lot.”
Participants at Manifesto Project events are asked to answer three open-ended questions and vote on top responses in hopes of contributing to a statewide manifesto. Their names and interests are collected as well in order to get them in touch with like-minded local organizations.
Mathematics and sustainability junior Chris Barton, who organized the Tempe event last April, said one of the three questions they ask is what would make participants stay in Arizona forever.
"A lot of people had stuff like ‘If it wasn’t so racist here’ or ‘If I felt like there was a future here for me in my career,’” he said. “They understood it was a problem, but they also understood it wasn’t the end of the world. There’s a way past it.”
Barton said participants at previous events also seemed to have concerns that went largely unaddressed by local leaders in positions of power.
“On one hand, it’s kind of sad, because it means we’re not being represented, but on the other hand, it means that once we get in those positions in the next 15 years or so, if we hold true to what we think now, there’s going to be a lot of change coming,” Barton said.
Klein Johnson, who also founded SEED SPOT, said the statewide manifesto created would possibly be displayed on a banner in a public space where people could see the different initiatives.
“We have talked to a few of the high-rises in downtown Phoenix about displaying the manifesto," she said. "It may be in Phoenix for awhile, then move throughout the state."
Klein Johnson said the deadline for the statewide manifesto had been extended from early fall to December so as to reach out to other young leaders and gather input from students at more schools.
Whiteman said the next couple of months of the project would entail reaching out to leaders in different communities across the state willing to host events and also creating partnerships with nonprofit and business organizations.
He said he hoped the project would inspire a change in Arizona.
“Being a transplant from (Montana), I would love to stay in Arizona if I could see it as a community that embraces young leadership,” Whiteman said. “I want to stay in Arizona and not have to justify it.”
Reach the reporter at cncalde1@asu.edu or follow her on Twitter @katie_calderon