This story originally aired on NPR's All Things Considered, 1/3/12.

Young voters came out in huge numbers to elect Obama in 2008, but how many young people remain inspired and involved four years later? Democrats this year will be using their caucus to test how much support they have in the state, especially from the young voters. But those young caucus-goers may not show up this year -- at least not for Obama.

The Obama For America campaign’s communication director in Iowa, John Kraus says the caucuses are a chance to show that Obama’s network from 2008 hasn’t disappeared. Despite the state’s focus on Republican candidates, Kraus says young Iowans are still connected to the campaign and still devoted to Obama. “Whether it's the Iraq War or ending "don't ask don't tell," making college more affordable… Many of the things that he talked about in 2008 that inspired a lot of young people to get involved are issues that he delivered on,” said Kraus.

23 year-old Nick Cavanaugh is one of the more than 26,000 young Democrats who caucused for Obama in 2008. Back then, he was tan easy choice for Cavanaugh and his friends. “I'm pretty sure everybody was excited about Obama in 2008,” said Cavanugh.

But this year, Cavanaugh says he doesn’t know which candidate his peers support. Apart from a few Facebook posts here and there, no one talks about the caucuses. “It's the arguing in Washington, man, has really turned me off to it. So I’ve started ignoring it all. I used to be a lot more politically informed, but not anymore. I just kind of let it go,” he said.

By Jacqueline Cuddeback, Turnstyle News

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- I’ve lived in Iowa my whole life, and as a senior political science major at Coe College, I understand the importance of being politically active. But the moves made recently by President Obama and Congress, coupled with some of the outrageous statements made by mainstream Republican candidates, have me nervous as the Iowa caucus fast approaches; whom can I vote for? Not a president who believes it is OK to assassinate American citizens overseas, or a president who would repeal all of the progress made to protect the environment and the rights of gays. Third party?  Or just don’t vote – a show of no confidence, like the Occupy Movement was doing?  Then I realized there was a third option.

I worried about breaking the news to my friend Reid, a hard core liberal. “Don’t be mad at me,” I told him, “but I’m afraid I have to vote Republican this coming election.” “Me too,” said Reid. “I’m sure not voting for Obama -- I’m voting Ron Paul.”
My jaw dropped.

Reid said that although he supported Obama in 2008, he has followed the Texas Congressman for years. He was the only candidate he felt hadn’t lied to us and has the voting record to prove it.  “And I’m sorry, I don’t want to be declared a terrorist and ‘disappear’ in the middle of the night,” Reid said. Reid and I had been involved in the Occupy Cedar Rapids movement together, me silently documenting, him actively participating. I knew he was angry about Obama’s new budget plan. I just never expected him to lean Republican.

Reid demonstrates what John Della Volpe, the director of polling at Harvard’s Institute for Politics, told Turnstyle about our generation. This election season, the so-called 18 - 29 year-old Millennials are up for grabs, and Ron Paul has all the right moves. We might align with liberal ideas on paper, but in Iowa, the earliest state in the nation to caucus for presidential candidates, it’s Ron Paul who will get young voters out of the house to caucus in sub-freezing weather. “There is a chord clearly that Ron Paul is striking with young people,” said Volpe. “It’s just his incredible authenticity, and a focus on this libertarian, independent streak that young people have always had. And he’s also putting an effort behind it.”

Last week, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services decided to overrule the Food and Drug Administration’s report that Plan B emergency contraception was safe to sell over the counter. The Washington Post reports that this decision by the Obama administration symbolized a broken promise to honor scientific and medical evidence in the realm of public health.

At Youth Radio, we’ve been paying close attention to the school-based health centers popping up all over California and elsewhere. The main service they provide is access to reproductive health care. So how will this decision trickle down and impact school-based health centers and ultimately, America’s young people?

Sang Leng Trieu, Senior Program Manager for the California School Health Centers Association, said that emergency contraception is more effective the sooner one takes it. “We stress to students, anyone trying to avoid pregnancy, obtain it asap,” said Trieu. Therefore, the decision to make Plan B harder to obtain, will impact its efficacy. “Youth already have a more difficult time accessing reproductive health. They already have more barriers, like transportation,” she said.

According to Trieu, the most popular times for students to access health centers for reproductive care are Friday afternoons and Monday mornings. “If you have unprotected sex Friday night, and your provider is closed over the weekend, you have to wait until Monday morning,” she said.

Overall, Trieu said the decision is very sad for those in the public health field who have been working on this issue for a long time. “The fight is about increasing access in anyway we can,” said Trieu.

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced today that states will be able to apply for waivers if they wish to be exempt from the requirements laid out in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law, put in place during the Bush administration to raise academic standards, according to NPR.

The Washington Post quotes Duncan saying that states and local administrations are “clamoring” for change and that the law is dysfunctional, and calls for 100 percent of students to be proficient in math and reading by the year 2014, without providing support structures to reach that goal.

The Obama administration called for a major revision of the law, but Congress has yet to produce a draft. Since the law was up for re-authorization and revision, some in the House and Senate, as well as educators, are worried that the waivers will confuse the debate, and take the focus off of the major changes they believe need to be addressed in the re-writing of NCLB.

Others don’t think the waivers will matter at all.

One of these voices is Edward Williams, 2009 Teach for America corps member in Atlanta, Georgia, and current student at Georgetown University Law Center. “Arne Duncan and the Obama administrations' ‘waivers’ from the penalties of not meeting NCLB standards will not likely have any tangible results... It simply doesn’t force states that receive the waivers to implement the burdensome takeover models prescribed in the federal legislation,” he said.

Career and technical education may be facing deep financial cuts. A proposed federal budget could mean as much as a 20 percent reduction to funding for vocational programs in 2012, according to the New York Times. Obama instead seeks to increase funding for overall education by 11 percent.

The Times reports that these proposed cuts are a step toward the president’s goal of raising academic standards and ultimately have the highest share of college graduates of any other nation by 2020. But Dr. David Dabaco, a teacher at Lincoln High school Engineering and Construction Academy in Stockton, CA, disagrees with the president’s college-bound campaign.  “As a society we have to provide educational opportunities for all students, not just those college-bound,” he says. “If we can show these kids we can provide you with these skills and you’ll get your foot in the door, and you’ll make x numbers of dollars. That can break the cycle of poverty, and that’s an accomplishment.”

The Academy where Dabaco teaches is not a typical vocational program. It provides students with opportunities to choose from four unique career paths such as Architecture, Mechanical Construction, Construction Technology, and Cabinetry and Woodwork but at the same time exists within a traditional high school. 

The following originally aired on KCBS.

By Tajah Jones

When I first think of a villain I think of the joker, not Osama bin Laden.Bin Laden and the war seemed distant from my everyday life. What affected me was the racial prejudice against Muslims and people of color following September 11th.

During the last presidential election, there was a poster circulating of Barack Obama with a long beard and a turban. Beneath the image it read, “Obama bin Laden.” The image shocked me as extreme propaganda.

This really struck me when I visited my Muslim cousin in D.C. -- 6 years after 9/11. We went through airport security and my cousin was unnecessarily questioned because of her hijab. As if simply being Muslim made her dangerous – or a terrorist. Until then, I never associated being an American Muslim with Bin Laden. They seemed like two totally different things.

I know he’s supposed to be the scariest man of our time, or the face of evil, but Osama Bin Laden didn’t scare me. The people who don’t question what they hear -- they scare me.

President Obama has made it clear over and over again that education is extremely important to him, so it is not a surprise that he’s challenging public schools in his 2011 Commencement Challenge to demonstrate how their school best prepares their students for college and a career.

This friendly challenge consists of submitting essay questions and statistical information that shows, “how schools are promoting college and career readiness for all students while establishing a culture of student success and academic excellence.”

Schools need to submitt their applications by March 11 at 11:59 pm EST.

By Denise Tejada

President Obama held an online town hall meeting last year in which users submitted thousands and thousands of questions that he pledged to answer.  Ranked high among them was whether legalizing marijuana would improve the economy and job creation. President Obama was quick to express his opposition. He said he didn’t, “think that is a good strategy to grow our economy.”

Now, the president is set to hold another online town hall meeting on Thursday January 27. People can submit their questions to youtube.com/askobama or via Twitter using #askobama hashtag.

Dominating the polls is the same topic, marijuana. Here are some of the popular questions so far:

“Why are you not pursuing the legalization/decriminalization¬ of marjuana on a federal level when it is proven Mr. President that it would be a positive source of revenue for our dying economy and a positive source of safe treatment for the ill?”

“Dear Mr. President, Why are you against the legalisation of Marijuana? You yourself have admitted to smoking it, it can generate huge profits from taxation and people can enjoy themselves legally, as they're going to consume the drug anyway.”

“Mr. President, why is marijuana illegal considering that alcohol and tobacco kill millions of people a year, yet marijuana has nevery directly killed anyone?”

If you don’t like the questions being submitted then submit yours by midnight (ET) on Wednesday January 26.

In a controversial ruling, a New York judge decided on Monday that the New York City school system can publicly release the value-added rankings of school teachers. Many teachers are highly opposed to this decision because they say the rating system is flawed, while the judge declared that the job performance of public employees is fair game for public release, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Value-added analysis measures how much a student’s test scores improved over the time span that they had a specific teacher. One central argument against using this measure for teacher evaluation is that it does not take into account the pre-existing factors that might lower a student’s test performance. In addition, some teachers disagree with using standardized test scores as a way of measuring intelligence arguing that it does not require students to think critically.

However, school districts around the country have turned towards value-added analysis as a way to maintain teacher accountability and bring up student achievement. The Los Angeles Times first stirred up this controversy by publishing of the value-added rankings of LAUSD teachers in the paper.

In addition to making the rankings public, by 2013, New York State will require value-added analysis scores to count for 25 percent of a teacher’s performance evaluation. For more of Youth Radio’s coverage on the debate surrounding value-added analysis scores, click here.

This weekend, advocates from all over the country traveled to Washington D.C. to show their support for reauthorizing the Juvenile Justice Delinquency and Prevention Act (JJDPA) and passing the Youth PROMISE (Prison Reduction through Opportunities, Mentoring, Intervention, Support, and Education) Act.  The Community Justice Network for Youth held a two-day conference on Saturday and Sunday, and a press conference this morning to urge the Obama administration to change the disciplinary system for young people. 

Youth, parents, and advocates will visit their individual legislators after the press conference and show their support for these issues. The overall message of the weekend is that youth are being mistreated while incarcerated, when incarceration is not the most productive solution. In addition, money is being spent in the wrong places.

The speakers at the conference consisted of people with personal testimonials, policy advocates, and directors of youth support services.  Youth Radio spoke with two of them to get their personal perspective on the issue.