In a dorm room that probably doesn't have cable and with too much homework to even check the news once a day, it's easy for us to fall behind in our current events. But there are some news stories that are just too significant to our generation for us not to follow, such as...
1. Elections (and not just for president)
Seeing as much of our generation will be entering the workforce during the term of our next president, we should probably be paying attention to the campaigns and debates of the 2016 election race. However, what our age group often forgets in our opinion-charged political Facebook posts is that other elections do exist, and seeing as we aren’t a monarchy, they are just as significant. Keep up with your state and local elections -- they serve a larger purpose than you realize. (And while you’re at it, why not keep up with the progress of global elections too?)
2. The European Migrant Crisis
Remember hearing about all the Syrian refugees this past summer? Well, that’s still a thing. A major thing. The EU has its hands full with migrants not just from Syria but war torn countries like Afghanistan and Albania as well. We should be following this not only because it is a huge socioeconomic change in our world, but also because it involves over 700,000 people risking their lives to escape ongoing violence—something we in the U.S. for the most part have the luxury of not worrying about. Learn about it here to see how you can help.
3. The New Vocational School
You know how our parents talk about how “back in the day” kids weren’t necessarily expected to go to college? How many of them went to specific vocational schools where they learned how to be a mechanic or electrician? We don’t really hear about that anymore, but we will soon. Welcome to “coder bootcamp,” where students attend 12 weeks of classes in technology and app development to gain the skills they need to be hired by companies like Google without the degree from MIT. Check it out here.
4. Our Journey to Mars
5. Conflict in the Middle East
Why do we need to understand the conflict in the Middle East? Because we don’t understand it. And based on the fact that we can barely grasp it now, the issue probably won’t be going away anytime soon because it is that complicated, so we might as well learn about it before we go out into the real world. Want to know the real history? Take the 10 minutes you’d be using to watch snap stories to listen to our man John Green’s history lesson.
6. Climate Change
It’s easy to forget about this unglamorous one. As much as we’d love to save the poor polar bear standing on a floating slab of ice, a lot of us feel that we really aren’t seeing much harm come to us due to climate change. Actually, most of us in the U.S. and China, the two countries producing the largest amount of greenhouse gases, don’t see it as a serious problem at all. But are we staying updated enough to know if our comfort is based in scientific proof? Read up on it—at least these cities would like you to.
7. Worldwide Equality
We had our landmark victory for equality over the summer, but we know there’s still progress to be made. Speaking of progress to be made, what about our global brothers and sisters? We enthusiastically keep up with our own fight for equality, but many countries in the world don’t even have the freedom of speech to do so. Here’s the latest out of the most recent success out of Colombia.
8. Violence Against Women
As shocking as our “1 in 6 women have been sexually assaulted” U.S. statistic is, it should come as no surprise that that number is even higher in a global society including sex trafficking and child brides. What’s important here is that we could potentially help the seemingly helpless situation from where we are just by raising awareness, as this puts pressure on governments to address the issue. Instead of just reading statistics, follow unique stories (like this one) to learn about the most up to date programs and ideas.
9. Child Poverty
Child poverty is ever-present today, and not just in the underdeveloped nations across the world we automatically think of. In fact, our generation should be the most concerned about the issue because it is actually worsening due to rising income inequality. 1 in 7 children in the 34 richest nations in the world are in poverty. Think about it.
10. Campus Violence
Why this is applicable to us is pretty obvious. Mass shootings have escalated to a whole new level in the past few years—there have been 140 school shootings since Sandy Hook in the U.S. alone—and they are especially prevalent on college campuses. It’s important for us not just to pay attention to each occurrence, but to pay attention to the patterns and history of the occurrences. Maybe by looking back, we can understand and hopefully help prevent future disasters from adding to the list.
11. Education
