Millennials on school board may be start of something big

The fed up, disillusioned, we-won’t-takeit-anymore vibe that is sweeping the nation is seeping into local politics as well.

By now we’re all familiar with high-profile expressions of this sentiment.

But there’s another, extremely necessary next step forming as well.

If people really want to see positive changes, they must engage with the institutions and officials that affect our daily lives at the grass roots.

It’s a trickle, but definitive countermeasures to our ugly political partisanship are forming. And Donald Trump shouldn’t receive all of the credit. The genesis of what is occurring was visible before his election. And to make any real impact, the activism must be sustained long after he leaves office.

Consider the organization Run For Something. Conceived as a way to harness the passion and advance the interests of millennials, it launched on the day Trump was inaugurated. The effort literally grew out of the embers of Hillary Clinton’s devastated campaign, through the disenchantment of one of her staff.

Amanda Litman, Clinton’s 27-year-old email director, co-founded it in an attempt to get under-35year-olds to run for office. Any office counts.

By summer, more than 10,000 people had expressed an interest.

The organization endorsed another 37 candidates last week, adding to the nearly 100 it has already backed — all firstand second-time millennial candidates. Run For Something helps link people with groups such as Emily’s List or groups that help train people for political office.

Nearly half of the candidates supported are people of color or women.

If America is ever to have a Congress that mirrors the demographics of the nation, this is the route it must take.

Increasingly, members of Congress are disconnected from the general public in more ways than they are connected. It’s a problem for both Democrats and Republicans.

A lot of groups are diving in to address the problem. Emerge America has been training women interested in running for political office. Brand New Congress is a similar candidate-recruitment effort formed by Bernie Sanders supporters.

And the Indivisible movement has taken root in cities nationwide by offering a downloadable guidebook (www.IndivisibleGuide.com) that explains much about how members of Congress function and what makes them responsive to constituents.

If you are thinking that most of these newbie candidates have no chance of winning, you’re probably right.

That’s one of the first les- sons Litman emphasizes. Her book, “Run for Something: A Real-Talk Guide to Fixing the System Yourself,” was published in early October.

Most will likely take a pass on many of these candidates because they are unseasoned and underfunded.

The test is if they come back for a second campaign. Or if serving on a school board eventually inspires someone to try a statewide office.

Apologies to moms everywhere, but the admonition to mind one’s elders is a little out of date. In case you haven’t heard, millennials (those born between 1982 and 2000) outnumber baby boomers. Those numbers could be leveraged as a political force, and that could make a huge difference for life in America.