Here’s a bit of cheery news.   Young people could help Iowa prevent a trending downward slide to becoming a third world country/state.  (If they can overcome our spiffy new voter ID law that makes it harder for just about everyone to vote).  Nevertheless, this is hopeful information from CIRCLE ( (Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement)

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In many communities, young people make up a substantial proportion of the population, yet are sometimes not included in campaign outreach. More local elections can help to connect issues youth care about in their communities to elections. The Youth Electoral Significance Index (YESI) utilizes indicators of demographics, historical voting patterns, and projected competitiveness to produce a ranking of the states and districts where young people (ages 18-29) have the highest potential for impact on the 2018 elections.

Today, CIRCLE is releasing the top 10 congressional districts where young people might have an especially high electoral influence. Later this month will release the top ten Senate and Governor races.

Here’s why these ten districts ranked so highly:

Iowa 1st (Cedar Rapids) – Iowa’s 1st district has 20 colleges and universities and a high proportion of 18 to 29-year-olds enrolled in college (over 40%). The district population is predominantly white and young people had one of the 20 best turnout rates in the nation in the 2014 midterms: 22%. There are several so-called pivot counties in this district, meaning that voters supported President Obama in 2012 and President Trump in 2016; so competitiveness will be a factor.

(click here to read the entire article at civicyouth.org)