May 15, 2025
To: Librarians of Utah County
From: Mrs. Smith’s 8th Grade US History class at Springville Junior High School
We, a class of youth in junior high school, have a project to make an activity that will help solve a problem we have in today's world. Our first step in doing this was to figure out the main concerns in our world today. We had a great discussion talking about issues. We had a discussion asking why five times to find our main problem. This discussion taught us that political polarization is a major issue today in America because if we were all together, we could solve most of the world's problems.
The current political division is hurting us and the world. The failure to see the opposing point of view leads to arguments and division. Division is not just hurting us, but also changing who we are as people. This political division is causing there to be no communication whatsoever, and that makes anger rise, especially when people are going against each other in politics. This is not how a country should be and we need to fix it. We should all be able to listen to other points of view, never be violent towards each other, keep relationships even if you believe differently, and be able to connect no matter who you voted for.
Republicans and Democrats are further apart in ideas than they ever have been. “Both parties have grown more ideologically cohesive. There are now only about two dozen moderate Democrats and Republicans left on Capitol Hill, versus more than 160 in 1971-72,” says Drew Desilver.
This is partly due to social media. Social media algorithms make it so people only see certain viewpoints, which adds extra bias. Modern media, especially cable news and digital platforms, amplify partisan perspectives. Algorithms on social media platforms such as Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) curate content based on users’ preferences, creating echo chambers where individuals are exposed only to viewpoints they already agree with. Social media and political polarization are deeply intertwined. Here’s how algorithms work. “A 2024 study by Stanford University found that politically charged posts are more likely to go viral.” This incentivizes content creators to produce divisive and emotionally charged material. As a result, users are bombarded with highly polarized content, reinforcing existing biases and deepening divisions.
As we discussed what we could do about the issue of political polarization, we thought that if we could make people with different views talk, we could help people get along better. Somebody had the great idea of political speed dating, where people sit in an inner circle and people on an outer circle switch every ten minutes, and the two people facing each other would talk about their view of political issues. Next, we took a vote, and the majority voted for political speed dating. We hoped that we could get libraries to host this activity. We got together into different groups, and each group worked together to write a part of our letter. Once we were done, the teacher checked in and we worked more. We figured out where our work goes in our letter, and we put our work together.
We recognize that there could be issues when libraries conduct this activity. To address this we have created some helps for the libraries to use. First, we think it is important that youth be involved because the future generations are in charge of improving the state of our society. For us to have a solid chance of doing this, we need to learn about what the problems are and we need to be involved in the solution.
A few of the ideas suggested for involving the Youth directly in this project were: to call upon them to be moderators, give them a checklist or paper filled with conversation starters/questions to keep conversations going, the youth can help direct people on how the event will work, etc. The article, Building Youth Movements for Community Change, written by Taj James and Kim McGillicuddy, states that "They recognized that punitive practices were not solving any problems and invited the youth to join in reflective circles to talk. Inviting the Youth to join conversations is what we believe to be the most beneficial; which is why we have created a list of conversational questions the Youth can use as a guide. People are welcome to add or suggest questions. We will provide the list below, in the link.
We have created a list of conversational questions that can be used in the speed talking event. Are youth conducting and the adults moving around or is this only youth who are moving around? Do we want both? Of course, people are welcome to change the questions for your event. Speed Talking Questions
We also created this Link to the steps to make it easier document. We recognize the possibility that there could be conflict at this event. To prevent conflict we think you could get someone at the beginning to talk about the rules. The rules would be that you have to be respectful and listen to others without interrupting, not to make assumptions about the other side, if you don't agree with the other side, respectfully explain why, and no physical contact. After the person speaking says all that they would tell them if they don't follow the rules and are disrespectful, they would be asked to leave.
There is a quote in the Constitution, “We the people,” meaning that we the people are the government so we must unite together and work together to be a better country. We need to learn how to talk to each other and maybe, more importantly, to learn to listen to and respect each other too.
Sincerely,
Mrs. Smith’s 8th Grade 1st period US History Class at Springville Junior High
Aramis , brigham, sawyer, London, Darren, Maisy, Maylee, Isabella
Eva, Jaxson, Alexa
Brielle!!
Griffin
Aaron
Martina
Jackson.F
Ethan
Emma
William
Joe
Chase
Candon
Blythe
Roxy
Isa
Kristina
Cristian