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Essay on Apolitical Education for Students [500+ Words Essay]

December 20, 2020 by Sandeep

Essay on Apolitical Education: Education system governed by unbiased minds of political background is key to the growth and development of a nation. Experts encourage intellectual learning, scholarly teaching and scientific form of gaining knowledge through education. This kind of system allows open views and neutral thinking without reference to any political alignment. Education should not have any connection or link with politics or power plays. Saffronisation of education is the latest issue with respect to apolitical education in our country.

Essay on Apolitical Education 500 Words in English

Education is one of the fundamental rights guaranteed in our constitution . Education brings perspective to human beings. The difference between being educated and uneducated is that, education helps a man become learned and gives him a good direction in his life. It helps him find good jobs according to the degrees he has earned for himself and helps him achieve a good status in society. An uneducated person comes across as an ignorant and not-so knowledgeable man and usually finds himself in a complex situation when around educated people. In this article, we learn more about the role of politics in education and how they can affect the education system against society’s welfare.

Education and Politics

Political science is a subject that those students prefer who wish to get into politics as a career for the future, but the enrolment of politicians in such formal courses before they actually turned politicians is very scarce or negligible. Whether politicians actually have a formal background in education or have sought training before entering into active politics is questionable. There is hardly anyone who likes to answer it in reality. But when we talk about apolitical education, our concerns are totally different.  If we were to see a connection between education and politics, we come across many a links to check.

Today, most of the schools and colleges are set up by the top politicians of our country whose primary motive is to squeeze the pockets of common men to enrich their treasures. They may provide good education amenities, but it’s certainly difficult to take out politics from education at such center. Politicians try to woo students with their way of thinking by telling young minds to adhere to their policies and principles.

Apolitical Education Panels

Apolitical education means setting up an education system that is provided by, set up and nurtured by a panel consisting of the country’s top intellectual minds, scientific achievers and scholars with an unbiased frame of mind. Essentially we should take care that they are not propagating any particular political party and are not participating in active politics of any form. By not being in politics whatsoever, we can ensure that such an eminent panel does not throw any kind of bias in the education system.

If we were to consider a committee preparing textbooks for schools, the authorities should be totally pro-education having neutral and open views towards society and not aligned towards any one political set up or system. This power of setting up such a neutral thinking panel actually lies in the hands of the government serving the country at the centre. So in short, the present government at the centre should effectively take steps to set up a pro-country panel that involves in disbursing education without the elements of politics in them.

Apolitical Student Councils

Whenever there is an election taking place at schools or colleges, especially at college levels, we can find a lot of events taking place that may be politically influenced. That is because college elections are taken over by those students who have a personal link or connection with politics and participate in elections to show their political power in their place of study as well. The students’ councils at famous colleges are so politicised that every other important decision becomes a politically decided factor and not merging with the standards of the school principles.

How to make our education apolitical?

When we increase the proximity of politics in our education, the value of the whole system is certainly brought down to low standards. Today we hear a lot about saffronisation of education. Let us try to understand this from a political point of view. When a political party ‘A’ with a certain set of values is in power at the centre, it tries to influence the masses with their political view point. So, it brings about a revision of syllabus and alters the curriculum and contents according to their stance and opinions. Basically, the education system becomes a pawn in the hands of the political party carrying on the current regime.

We are left wondering if educational centers in our country actually teach our kids to become knowledgeable and learned or impart things that are part of a greater selfish motive of a certain political party. Similarly when another political party holds place in the centre in the next term, it tries to push its party’s agenda by captivating the education system. So, on a general note the political parties try to play double games in the name of power and actually steal the common masses of their rights to liberal education.

What we get at the end is the disposal of politicised education that has the thoughts and insights of a particular political party and not information or knowledge as is. The next big question the country is facing as a challenge is how to make our education system apolitical and how to save our education from the clutches of a few influential political bigwigs. The answer to this is simple yet complicated and entangled in a complex array of issues. When a politician decides to open a school or college using his money power or influence, he puts in his party’s perspectives at first and this enters young minds that are forced to think on similar lines. This is a common scenario happening at every other place in our country.

If the government comes up with a rule that allows enrolment of such schools only on certain strict conditions, situations may change. Schools should get permission only when they disburse education by keeping away the element of politics outside the school’s corridors. Regulations should become effective that direct educational centers to presume an offence created whenever they resort to any kind of political disbursement in the school campus. Eminent panels of educationalists should be allowed to regulate schools and top management should be directed to only provide liberal educational services to students.

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Educators learning through struggle: Political education in social justice caucuses

• Published: 04 October 2021
• Volume 24 , pages 291–315, ( 2023 )

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• Rhiannon M. Maton   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1658-5205 1 &
• Lauren Ware Stark 2  

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At a time when educators are increasingly rising up within and beyond their unions to protect public education, it is vital to understand how activist educators become politicized and how their activist organizations contribute to such political education efforts. In this article, Maton and Stark examine the grassroots organizing work of three educator-led social justice caucuses and a national network in order to explicate how five forms of political education—relational, structured, situational, mobilized, and networked—support educators’ political learning within and beyond their unions. We tease apart the characteristics and central knowledge sources inherent to these five forms of political education, showcasing examples of how caucuses capitalize upon and embed political education within their change-making efforts.

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It may be argued that there are localized examples of social justice caucuses and unions embracing values and priorities that at times diverge from community interest. However, the literature shows that social justice unionism as a philosophy and movement strives to avoid such divisions and foster solidarity amongst unions, union members, community groups, and community members (Fletcher & Gapasin, 2008 ; McAlevey, 2016 ; Weiner, 2012 ).

Ideological diversity among caucus members can, at times, foster tensions within caucuses. For example, some caucus members may prioritize internal union politics while others prioritize advocating for curricular reforms. These tensions can be productive when navigated through democratic processes, but unresolved tensions risk alienating new members. For more on intracaucus tensions, see Asselin ( 2019 ) and Stark ( 2019 ).

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Maton, R.M., Stark, L.W. Educators learning through struggle: Political education in social justice caucuses. J Educ Change 24 , 291–315 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10833-021-09444-0

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s10833-021-09444-0

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The Role of Education in Democracy

• Posted October 8, 2020
• By Jill Anderson

Many people question the state of democracy in America. This is especially true of young people, who no longer share the same interest in democracy as the generations before them. Professor Danielle Allen , director of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, has long studied what citizens need in order to succeed in democracy and how our social studies and civics education have impacted democracy.

"We have really disinvested in civic education and social studies. You can see that now in the comparison that we currently spend $54 per year per kid of federal dollars on STEM education and only 5 cents per year per kid on civics,” Allen says. “We have really ceased to lay the foundation in K–12 for young people to understand democracy, be motivated to participate in it, to have the skills and tools they need to participate effectively, and as a result, enjoy participation."

In this episode, Allen discusses how we got where we are today and what it will take to reinvest in education for democracy.

• Find ways to tell “an integrated version of U.S. history that is simultaneously honest about the crimes and wrongs of the past, but without falling into cynicism,” Allen says.
• When broaching a challenging topic in the classroom, begin from a place of inquiry. Try not to start with the instructional content or even understanding the issue, but let students think about what comes to mind about the issue and record their feelings and how they connect to it. “I think it’s really important that teachers be able to see what the starting points are – both analytically and emotionally that students have for engaging with these issues,” she says.
• To raise engaged citizens, Allen suggests bringing democratic practices of reason giving into the life of a family. “There are lots of lessons inside a family that can feed in to help the understanding of democratic practice,” Allen says.

 I'm Jill Anderson. This is the Harvard EdCast. Harvard's Danielle Allen knows young people aren't as invested in democracy like the generations before them. Today, fewer than 30% under age 40 even consider it important to live in a democracy. Allen is a political theorist who's long studied what citizens need in order for democracy to succeed.

Education plays a big part in how we think about democracy, yet America's classrooms haven't always emphasized these subjects. With the presidential election just weeks away, I wanted to understand how education can preserve democracy and whether tensions rising in America signal a change underway.

Danielle Allen: In another moment of crisis in the country, The Cold War, the country really turned to science and technology to meet the moment. So there's the period during World War II, the Manhattan Project, for example, which really brought universities into the project of supporting national security with the pursuit of the atom bomb. That was a point in time, it was really the beginning of decades long investment in STEM education. That was important.

We needed to do that, but at the same time, over that same 50 year period, we have really disinvested in civic education and social studies. You can see that now in the comparison that we currently spend $54 per year per kid of federal dollars on STEM education and only 5 cents per year per kid on civics. So we have really ceased to lay the foundation in K–12 for young people to understand democracy, be motivated to participate in it, to have the skills and tools they need to participate effectively and as a result, enjoy participation.

Jill Anderson: We're also living in a time when teaching history is being really politicized and I'm wondering how you think we can effectively teach history and democracy to young people.

Danielle Allen: I've been really privileged over the last 15 months or so to be a part of a cross-institutional network under the banners and they call it the Educating for American Democracy Project and my center Harvard, the ethics centers participating. Jane Kamensky, who directs the Schlesinger Library for Women as a PI Tufts, Arizona state university and this group has pulled together a network of hundreds of scholars across the country with the goal of developing a blueprint, a roadmap for the integration of history and civics education K–12.

The reason I'm going through all of that is because at an early point in our work, directly thinking about the issue you just raised or polarization of our national history and polarization of education around civics, we decided that we were going to do two things on our roadmap.

One was to really structure it around inquiry to really focus on the kinds of questions that should be asked over the span of K–12 more so than on the answers and also that we would really focus on design challenges. That instead of seeing the disagreement about how to narrate our nation's history as a kind of end of the conversation, we would see it as the beginning of a conversation. So for instance, one of the design challenges we put to educators is that we have to find a way to tell an integrated version of US history that is simultaneously honest about the crimes and wrongs of the past, but without falling into cynicism and also appreciative in appropriate ways of the founding era without tipping into gamification.

So what we try to do is to say, "This is a design challenge. We don't know exactly what the answer is to meriting a history in this way that integrates clear-eyed view of the problems as well as a clear-eyed view of the goods and the potentialities, but we believe it can be done and we believe that this big country with so many committed educators is a place where we can experiment our way into solutions."

Jill Anderson: Right. One of the things I think is interesting as you look at the polls and voter turnout, and you often see young people not being as engaged, but when you look at some of the protests that have been happening around the country, it seems to be largely younger people. Is that a shift happening in our democracy where young people are maybe becoming more engaged?

Danielle Allen: It's certainly the case that young people are showing engagement through their participation in social movements and protests. In that regard, the moment is a lot like the 1960s with similar levels of engagement from young people. The question is whether or not young people who engage in the democracy tool of a social movement or of a protest can also understand themselves to have access to the tool of using political institutions. So social movements are an important part of the democracy toolkit, but they're just a part.

So it's really a question of whether or not young people see value in political institutions too, and can knit these things together. To some extent, I think that actually we really need to do work to redesign, even for example, our electoral system. So when we look around and we see that lots of people are disaffected or alienated or feel disempowered, that doesn't just mean that they're sort of haven't got enough education or don't have the right perspective.

It also means that our institutions aren't delivering what they promise. They're not responsive. They don't generally empower ordinary people and they very often don't deliver sort of equal representation. So in that regard, everybody, all citizens, civic participants have a job to do to think about redesigning our institutions so that they achieve those things.

On that front. I was again, fortunate to participate with a huge network of people through the American Academy Of Arts And Sciences, a commission on the future of the of practice of democratic citizenship and we released a report in June the 31 recommendations, a chunk of which are about redesigning our electoral system to deliver that responsive, empowering form of government that also provides equal representation.

Jill Anderson: Do you think something like this pandemic could be a tipping point because so much has moved online and I'm wondering how you think that might change civic action in education?

Danielle Allen: Well, the pandemic without any question is a huge exogenous shock, as we would say in social sciences, that it's a transformative event. Period. The magnitude is so significant. I think we're a very long way from being able to see and understand all of its impacts and consequences. For me personally, one of the things it has driven home is the weaknesses in our practices of governance. These weaknesses are partly institutional and partly cultural. Our polarization is one of the significant causes of our failure to come to grips with the current crisis. So I think for lots of people, the pandemic is really bringing our vulnerabilities to the surface. Also, for example, the disparate impacts across racial and ethnic groups of the disease and the underlying disparities in health equity has really come to the fore to visibility. So I think a lot of people are really focused in a more intensive way than in the past on addressing those problems.

I always sort of have a lot of confidence in the kind of creative energies of human beings when they really sort of see and face problems. So I believe that the moment does give us an opportunity to transform our conception of what we want for our society, what it means to name the public good, what it means to invest in the public good and my hope is that we'll be able to pull energy around a concept of the public good with us in the coming years.

Jill Anderson: We have this huge election coming up and the pandemic has somewhat overshadowed the election a little bit. I look at parents and their children and wonder are there things that parents could be doing at home to help raise their children to be more engaged and value democracy?

Danielle Allen: Well, I think there are a number of things. I mean, I actually think it matters to bring democratic practices of reason giving for example, into the life of a family. That can be very hard. Family structures are often and for very good reason, very hierarchical. So within the sort of context of hierarchical family structures, how can parents foster reason giving, hear their children's reasons for things, help their children understand what it means to engage in the back and forth around reasons, help them understand what it means for one person to lose out in one decision-making moment, but then to win out in another moment and nonetheless, even though we sort of exchange sacrifices for one another over the course of collective decision-making, our commitment to our social bond is so strong that that makes that sort of exchange of burdens tolerable. So I think there are lots of lessons inside a family that can feed into help the understanding of democratic practice.

Jill Anderson: One last final question would be if you have any thoughts or advice to share with the teachers out there who are working hard, and many of them working remotely to try to teach lessons about the upcoming election and all the things happening in the world.

Danielle Allen: So teachers really always have a hard job, and it's so hard now between the remote learning and the intensity of the external environment, the political questions and the debates and so forth. I think it's really important to remember that different students will bring different kinds of perspectives and exposures with them into the classroom. So I think when a teacher is trying to engage a hard topic, whether it's a hard element of history or a controversial issue in our contemporary debates, it's really important to start by bringing to the surface what's already in students' minds.

So maybe you use a Google doc, maybe you use a chat function, but when a topic comes up before sort of launching into the instructional content or the real digesting of the issue, just go ahead and let the students record the first thing that comes to mind for them when they hear the relevant issue and let them record the emotion that they connect to that issue. I think it's really important that teachers be able to see what the starting points are, both analytically and emotionally that students have for engaging with these [inaudible 00:10:35] issues.

Jill Anderson: Well, I want to thank you so much for taking the time and talking and sharing your thoughts today.

Danielle Allen: Thank you, Jill. Appreciate your interest.

Jill Anderson: Danielle Allen is the director of the Edmond J. Safra Center For Ethics at Harvard. She's a professor at the Harvard graduate school of education and faculty of arts and sciences. She leads the Democratic Knowledge Project, which focuses on how to strengthen and build that knowledge that democratic citizens need to operate their democracy. I'm Jill Anderson. This is the Harvard EdCast produced by the Harvard graduate school of education. Thanks for listening.

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If you are still unsure how to structure your essay or how to present your statement, don't worry. Our team of experts has prepared an excellent essay example for you. Feel free to explore and examine it. Use it to guide you through the writing process and help you understand what a successful essay looks like.

How to Write a Political Essay: Tips + Guide

A well-written essay is easy to read and digest. You probably remember reading papers full of big words and complex ideas that no one bothered to explain. We all agree that such essays are easily forgotten and not influential, even though they might contain a very important message.

If you are writing an essay on politics, acknowledge that you are on a critical mission to easily convey complicated concepts. Hence, what you are trying to say should be your main goal. Our guide on how to write a political essay will help you succeed.

Conduct Research for Your Politics Essay

After choosing a topic for the essay, take enough time for preparation. Even if you are familiar with the matter, conducting thorough research is wiser. Political issues are complex and multifaceted; comprehensive research will help you understand the topic better and offer a more nuanced analysis.

Research can help you identify different viewpoints and arguments around the topic, which can be beneficial for building more impartial and persuasive essays on politics. Sometimes in the hit of the moment, opposing sides are not able to see the common ground; your goal is to remain rational, speak to diverse audiences, and help them see the core of the problem and the ways to solve it.

In political papers, accuracy and credibility are vital. Researching the topic deeply will help you avoid factual errors or misrepresentations from any standpoint. It will allow you to gather reliable sources of information and create a trustworthy foundation for the entire paper.

If you want to stand out from the other students, get inspired by the list of hottest essay ideas and check out our political essay examples.

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Brainstorm Political Essay Topics

The next step to writing a compelling politics essay is to polish your thoughts and find the right angle to the chosen topic.

Before you start writing, generate fresh ideas and organize your thoughts. There are different techniques to systematize the mess going on in your head, such as freewriting, mind mapping, or even as simple as listing ideas. This will open the doors to new angles and approaches to the topic.

When writing an essay about politics, ensure the topic is not too general. It's always better to narrow it down. It will simplify your job and help the audience better understand the core of the problem. Brainstorming can help you identify key points and arguments, which you can use to find a specific angle on the topic.

Brainstorming can also help you detect informational gaps that must be covered before the writing process. Ultimately, the brainstorming phase can bring a lot more clarity and structure to your essay.

We know how exhausting it is to come up with comparative politics essay topics. Let our research paper writing service team do all the hard work for you.

Create Your Politics Essay Thesis Statement

Thesis statements, in general, serve as a starting point of the roadmap for the reader. A political essay thesis statement outlines the main ideas and arguments presented in the body paragraphs and creates a general sense of the content of the paper.

Creating a thesis statement for essays about politics in the initial stages of writing can help you stay focused and on track throughout the working process. You can use it as an aim and constantly check your arguments and evidence against it. The question is whether they are relevant and supportive of the statement.

Get creative when creating a statement. This is the first sentence readers will see, and it should be compelling and clear.

The following is a great example of a clear and persuasive thesis statement:

 'The lack of transparency and accountability has made the World Trade Organization one of the most controversial economic entities. Despite the influence, its effectiveness in promoting free trade and economic growth in developing countries has decreased.'

Provide Facts in Your Essay about Politic

It's a no-brainer that everything you will write in your essay should be supported by strong evidence. The credibility of your argument will be questioned every step of the way, especially when you are writing about sensitive subjects such as essays on government influence on economic troubles. 

Provide facts and use them as supporting evidence in your politics essay. They will help you establish credibility and accuracy and take your paper out of the realm of speculation and mere opinions.

Facts will make your essay on political parties more persuasive, unbiased, and targeted to larger audiences. Remember, the goal is to bring the light to the core of the issue and find a solution, not to bring people even farther apart.

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Structure Your Political Essay

Your main goal is to communicate your ideas to many people. To succeed, you need to write an essay that is easy to read and understand. Creating a structure will help you present your ideas logically and lead the readers in the right direction.

Sometimes when writing about political essay topics, we get carried away. These issues can be very emotional and sensitive, and writers are not protected from becoming victims of their own writings. Having a structure will keep you on track, only focusing on providing supported arguments and relevant information.

Start with introducing the thesis statement and provide background information. Followed by the body paragraphs and discuss all the relevant facts and standpoints. Finish it up with a comprehensive conclusion, and state the main points of your essay once again.

The structure will also save you time. In the beginning, creating an outline for essays on politics will give you a general idea of what should be written, and you can track your progress against it.

Revise and Proofread Your Final Politics Essay

Once every opinion is on the paper and every argument is well-constructed, one final step should be taken. Revision!

We know nothing is better than finishing the homework and quickly submitting it, but we aim for an A+. Our political essay must be reviewed. You need to check if there is any error such as grammatical, spelling, or contextual.

Take some time off, relax, and start proofreading after a few minutes or hours. Having a fresh mind will help you review not only grammar but also the arguments. Check if something is missing from your essays about politics, and if you find gaps, provide additional information.

You had to spend a lot of time on them, don't give up now. Make sure they are in perfect condition.

Effective Political Essay Topics

We would be happy if our guide on how to write political essays helped you, but we are not stopping there. Below you will find a list of advanced and relevant political essay topics. Whether you are interested in global political topics or political science essay topics, we got you covered.

Once you select a topic, don't forget to check out our politics essay example! It will bring even more clarity, and you will be all ready to start writing your own paper.

Political Argumentative Essay Topics

Now that we know how to write a political analysis essay let's explore political argumentative essay topics:

• Should a political party take a stance on food politics and support policies promoting sustainable food systems?
• Should we label Winston Churchill as the most influential political figure of World War II?
• Does the focus on GDP growth in the political economy hinder the human development index?
• Is foreign influence a threat to national security?
• Is foreign aid the best practice for political campaigning?
• Does the electoral college work for an ideal political system?
• Are social movements making a real difference, or are they politically active for temporary change?
• Can global politics effectively address political conflicts in the modern world?
• Are opposing political parties playing positive roles in US international relations?
• To what extent should political influence be allowed in addressing economic concerns?
• Can representative democracy prevent civil wars in ethnically diverse countries?
• Should nuclear weapons be abolished for the sake of global relations?
• Is economic development more important than ethical issues for Caribbean politics?
• What role should neighboring nations play in preventing human rights abuse in totalitarian regimes?
• Should political decisions guide the resolution of conflicts in the South China Sea?

Political Socialization Essay Topics

Knowing how to write a political issue essay is one thing, but have you explored our list of political socialization essay topics?

• To what extent does a political party or an influential political figure shape the beliefs of young people?
• Does political influence shape attitudes toward environmental politics?
• How can individuals use their own learning process to navigate political conflicts in a polarized society?
• How do political strategies shape cultural globalization?
• Is gender bias used as a political instrument in political socialization?
• How can paying attention to rural communities improve political engagement?
• What is the role of Amnesty International in preventing the death penalty?
• What is the role of politically involved citizens in shaping minimum wage policies?
• How does a political party shape attitudes toward global warming?
• How does the federal system influence urban planning and attitudes toward urban development?
• What is the role of public opinion in shaping foreign policy, and how does it affect political decision making
• Did other countries' experiences affect policies on restricting immigration in the US?
• How can note-taking skills and practice tests improve political engagement? 
• How do the cultural values of an independent country shape the attitudes toward national security?
• Does public opinion influence international intervention in helping countries reconcile after conflicts?

Political Science Essay Topics

If you are searching for political science essay topics, check our list below and write the most compelling essay about politic:

• Is environmental education a powerful political instrument? 
• Can anarchist societies provide a viable alternative to traditional forms of governance?
• Pros and cons of deterrence theory in contemporary international relations
• Comparing the impact of the French Revolution and World War II on the political landscape of Europe
• The role of the ruling political party in shaping national policies on nuclear weapons
• Exploring the roots of where politics originate
• The impact of civil wars on the processes of democratization of the third-world countries
• The role of international organizations in promoting global health
• Does using the death penalty in the justice system affect international relations?
• Assessing the role of the World Trade Organization in shaping global trade policies
• The political and environmental implications of conventional agriculture
• The impact of the international court on political decision making
• Is philosophical anarchism relevant to contemporary political discourse?
• The emergence of global citizenship and its relationship with social movements
• The impact of other countries on international relations between the US and China

Final Words

See? Writing an essay about politic seems like a super challenging job, but in reality, all it takes is excellent guidance, a well-structured outline, and an eye for credible information.

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Home — Essay Samples — Education — Importance of Education — The Impact Of Education On The Development Of Political Trust

The Interconnection Between Education and Politics

• Categories: Importance of Education Political Culture

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Published: May 7, 2019

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APOLITICAL EDUCATION

“Education is our safety, outside this ark, everything is a deluge” – Horace Mann

Since the dawn of civilization, the man had the urge to educate himself and discover the secrets hidden underneath the surface as of even, above them. Mans’s sappetite to know more had been the first step to educate themselves. With years, the craving to discover and invent heightened and formal institutes were set up. India, the land of divinity hosts the presence of one of the oldest universities in the world. This age has been classified as the Golden Age in ancient learning. With advancements, the education system in India evolved.

In the process of evolution, India lost its title of the global educator. The colonialization of India and its aftermath had affected the priorities of people. Now, the priorities were to meet the ends and have food, shelter; education had taken a backseat. After several years of independence, India stands at a 74.04% literacy rate. Ironically, many educationists have called India a land of rapid literacy growth but stagnant educated mass. Several reasons for this asymmetric growth have been observed, but, the most notable one is the intervention of politics.

The idea of political intervention is a big no, because political stand changes after every five years, but, education is an everlasting impact. Taking a political stance creates torrents of waves and biased views, which in turn creates a sense of fake patriotism. It is not a veiled thing that rival political parties would condemn each other thought process. But, that rivalry is limited to politics though, such a radical mindset can’t be undone in the minds of students. The most critically acclaimed textbooks, by NCERT, had faced such backlash by politicians for missing out certain nationalists. This was not the job of political leaders to intervene in an educational framework and caused a massive uproar. This is an example enough to prove that political intervention is not required in the educational sector.

In the tender age, full of youthfulness, students should rather focus on the development at the grassroots level.

Education and politics would go hand-in-hand if a mind develops enough to understand that they are being used as pawns and will be sacrificed in the fire of dirty politics. The original reality is often hidden from the naive eyes of students and seditious speeches cause enough damage to their already brimming adulthood. The politics are often done at the cost of dead martyrs which indeed is the most degrading truth.

A youth dominant nation like India which has capabilities to make a vast difference in the world order sadly is entangled in the political mess. Indians have been subjected to mediocre teaching systems due to this massive intervention, in one way or the other. Many bright minds prefer tp study abroad because they can’t withstand the whirlwind of politics. They get massive success but they don’t prefer to return. Such questions should haunt the leaders of India and active measures should be taken to improve the situation.

Politics and patriotism should not be presented as the same for young students as it takes the necessary element of education. Many bright minds go unnoticed due to political patronage. This is very unfair to students and an immediate solution must be provided as “Padhega India tabhi toh Badhega India.”

Courtesy :  ayushi rakesh  @ SpaceNova

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Democrats overwhelmingly favor free college tuition, while Republicans are divided by age, education

American adults generally support making tuition free at public colleges and universities for all U.S. students, yet there are sizable partisan and demographic differences in views of tuition-free college.

Republicans, in particular, are divided by age and educational attainment in opinions on this issue, according to a new Pew Research Center survey conducted July 8-18, 2021.

Among all U.S. adults, 63% favor making tuition at public colleges free, including 34% who strongly favor the proposal. Slightly more than a third oppose tuition-free college (36%), with 20% strongly opposed. These views are little changed over the past year.

Large shares of Black (86%), Hispanic (82%) and Asian American (69%) adults favor making college free for all Americans, compared with 53% of White adults. And while 73% of adults under age 30 favor this proposal, only about half (51%) of those ages 65 and older support it.

For this analysis on views of tuition-free college, we surveyed 10,221 U.S. adults from July 8-18, 2021. Everyone who took part is a member of Pew Research Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories. Read more about the  ATP’s methodology.  

Here are  the questions used  for this report, along with responses, and its methodology .

Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents overwhelmingly favor making college tuition free for all American students (85% support this). While 63% of Republicans and Republican leaners oppose making college tuition-free, 36% support this.

There are significant differences in these views among Republicans and GOP leaners: Those under age 30 are nearly twice as likely as those 65 and older to support making college tuition free for all Americans (45% vs. 23%).

And while Republicans who have completed college mostly oppose making tuition free for all American students, the proposal draws more support from Republicans who do not have a four-year degree.

The differences among Republicans are particularly stark when combining age and educational attainment. Among Republicans under age 50 who have not completed college, 52% favor making college tuition free for all Americans. Among Republican college graduates in this age group, only 30% support this.

Support for tuition-free college declines among older Republicans, regardless of whether or not they have completed college. However, even among Republicans ages 50 and older, those who have not completed college are more supportive of this proposal than those who have a college degree.

Note: This is an update of a post originally published Feb. 21, 2020. Here are  the questions used  for this report, along with responses, and its methodology .

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About half of Americans say the best age for a U.S. president is in their 50s

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How to Write the Political and Global Issues College Essay

Essays are one of the best parts of the college application process. With your grades in, your test scores decided, and your extracurriculars developed over your years in high school, your essays are the last piece of your college application that you have immediate control over. With them, you get to add a voice to your other stats, a “face” to the name, so to speak. They’re an opportunity to reveal what’s important to you and what sets you apart from other applicants and tell the admissions committee why you’d be an excellent addition to their incoming student class.

Throughout your college applications process, there are many different types of essays you’ll be asked to write. Some of the most popular essay questions you’ll see might include writing about an extracurricular, why you want to matriculate at a school, and what you want to study.

Increasingly, you might also see a supplemental college essay asking you to discuss a political or global issue that you’re passionate about. Asking this type of question helps colleges understand what you care about outside of your personal life and how you will be an active global citizen.

Some examples from the 2019-2020 cycle include:

Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service : Briefly discuss a current global issue, indicating why you consider it important and what you suggest should be done to deal with it.

Yeshiva University Honors Programs : What is one issue about which you are passionate?

Pitzer College : Pitzer College is known for our students’ intellectual and creative activism. If you could work on a cause that is meaningful to you through a project, artistic, academic, or otherwise, what would you do?

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Our chancing engine factors in extracurricular activities, demographic, and other holistic details.

Our chancing engine factors in extracurricular activities, demographic, and other holistic details. We’ll let you know what your chances are at your dream schools — and how to improve your chances!

Tips for Writing the Political and Global Issues College Essay

Pick an issue close to your life.

When you first see a political and global issues prompt, your gut reaction might be to go with a big-picture topic that’s all over the news, like poverty or racism. The problem with these topics is that you usually have a page or less to talk about the issue and why it matters to you. Students also might not have a direct personal connection to such a broad topic. The goal of this essay is to reveal your critical thinking skills, but the higher-level goal of every college essay is to learn more about who you are.

Rather than go with a broad issue that you’re not personally connected to, see if there’s just one facet of it that you  can  contend with. This is especially important if the prompt simply asks for “an issue,” and not necessarily a “global issue.” While some essay prompts will specifically ask that you address a  global  issue (like Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service), there are still ways to approach it from a more focused perspective.

For example, if you were to talk about world hunger, you could start with the hunger you see in your community, which is a food desert. For your solution, you can discuss your plan to build a community garden, so the town is able to access fresh produce. Food deserts, of course, aren’t the only reason world hunger exists; so, you should also explore some other reasons, and other solutions. Maybe there is a better way to prevent and recuperate produce currently being wasted, for instance. If the prompt doesn’t specifically ask for a global issue, however, you could simply focus on food deserts.

For another example, maybe you want to talk about climate change. A more personal and focused approach would deal with happenings in your community, or a community you’ve had contact with. For instance, perhaps your local river was polluted because of textile industry waste; in this case, it would be fitting to address fast fashion specifically (which is still a global issue).

Remember your audience

As you’re approaching this essay, take care to understand the political ramifications of what you’re suggesting and how the school you’re addressing might react to it. Make sure you understand the school’s political viewpoints, and keep in mind that schools are hoping to see how you might fit on their campus based on your response.

So, if you’re applying to a school known for being progressive, like Oberlin or Amherst, you might not want to write an essay arguing that religious freedom is under threat in America. Or, if you’re applying to Liberty University, you should probably avoid writing an essay with a strong pro-LGBTQ stance. You don’t have to take the opposite position, but try picking a different issue that won’t raise the same concerns.

If you have no political alignment, choose economics

If you find yourself applying to a school with which you share no political viewpoints, you might want to consider if the school would even be a good fit for you. Why do you really want to go there? Are those reasons worth it? If you think so, consider writing about an economic issue, which tend to be less contentious than social issues.

For instance, you could write about the impact of monopolies because your parents own an independent bookstore that has been affected by Amazon. Or you could discuss tax breaks for companies that keep or move their production domestically, after seeing how your town changed when factories were moved abroad. Maybe tax filing is a cause you’re really passionate about, and you think the government should institute a free electronic system for all. No matter what you write about here, the key is to keep it close to home however you can.

Pick the best possible framing

When you’re writing an essay that doesn’t fully align with the political views of the school you’re applying to, you’ll want to minimize the gap between your viewpoint and that of the school. While they still might disagree with your views, this will give your essay (and therefore you) the best possible chance. Let’s say you’re applying to a school with progressive economic views, while you firmly believe in free markets. Consider these two essay options:

Option 1:  You believe in free markets because they have pulled billions out of terrible poverty in the developing world.

Option 2:  “Greed is good,” baby! Nothing wrong with the rich getting richer.

Even if you believe equally in the two reasons above personally, essay option 1 would be more likely to resonate with an admissions committee at a progressive school.

Let’s look at another, more subtle example:

Option 1:  Adding 500 police officers to the New York City public transit system to catch fare evaders allows officers to unfairly and systematically profile individuals based on their race.

Option 2:  The cost of hiring 500 additional police officers in the New York City public transit system is higher than the money that would be recouped by fare evasion.

While you might believe both of these things, a school that places a lower priority on race issues may respond better to the second option’s focus on the fallible economics of the issue.

Structuring the Essay

Depending on how long the essay prompt is, you’ll want to use your time and word count slightly differently. For shorter essays (under 250 words), focus on your personal connection rather than the issue itself. You don’t have much space and you need to make it count. For standard essays (250-500 words), you can spend about half the time on the issue and half the time on your personal connection. This should allow you to get more into the nuance. For longer essays, you can write more on the issue itself. But remember, no matter how long the essay is, they ultimately want to learn about you–don’t spend so much time on the issue that you don’t bring it back to yourself.

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A Strategy for Teaching Students to Write Political Arguments

Modeling how to disagree on political issues of interest to middle and high school students boosts their critical thinking and literacy skills.

“Why aren’t our countries allies?” Great question from one of my eighth-grade English language learners (ELLs) back in 2010. As a teacher in an American school in Syria, I was well aware of why the United States and Syria weren’t on friendly terms, but as an American working hard to change the status quo, I had no intention of answering the question.

So I put it back on my students: “Why don’t you research that on the internet tonight and tell what you find out tomorrow.” I figured that by the next day, they would have forgotten all about it.

Far from forgetting about it, they came to class with copious notes, eagerly talked about how much Americans and Syrians had in common, and listed the benefits of being allies for both countries’ governments. I was impressed by my students’ knowledge and passion.

I used to shy away from having political conversations in class, but once I saw firsthand how they can support literacy, critical thinking skills, and students’ understanding of civics, I figured out ways to assign political essays in a way that was scrupulous, engaging, and even exciting .

Choose an Engaging Topic

Since my middle school ELL classes usually start with conversation time, I begin by choosing a topic in the news that has already caught their attention. For my regular classes, I choose a topic that the students have some interest in but have not formed strong opinions about, such as teacher pay raises, SAT scores for college admissions, or local recycling efforts.

Sometimes topics that aren’t current work well because they’re still rooted in critical thinking. For example, I’ve had British students argue for and against the American Revolution, which prompts them to debate points like the sacrifices that the British made during the French and Indian War versus the unfairness of taxation without representation, and the protection of Native Americans versus the desire for land. That exercise helps them understand the importance of examining all sides of current world conflicts.

I refrain from sharing too much information about topics because I don’t want my students to detect my opinions. Rather, I have them research and write down information they find themselves, either independently or in teams. I also emphasize the importance of gathering facts rather than opinions.

Discussion and Reasoning

During class discussion, I ask questions and encourage the students to form their own opinions without revealing my own. I tell them that they may change their opinion as the project progresses and that undecided counts as an opinion.

From there, students take three sheets of paper and write one reason for their opinion on each sheet, together with facts to support it. Then comes the fun part: I divide the class into groups of two or three to argue their point. I explain to them that even though they may personally agree with a classmate presenting an opposing view, they must try as hard as they can to demolish their reasoning—that’s what they’ll be graded on.

I model the process for them. My eager-to-please Syrian students were all in favor of Syria and the U.S. being allies, so they were shocked when I said the opposite. So they agreed with me... and then I disagreed with them. Once they realized what was happening, they relished arguing with their teacher and with each other.

Politics and history are not about parties, platforms, or theories, I tell my students; they’re about people. I also use the word argue along with the word debate because I want my students to understand that, since voting means making decisions about people’s lives, we should be passionate about politics and willing to listen. After all, if the founders of the United States did not believe passionately in “We the people,” the country would not exist.

When students argue their points, they can see the strengths and weaknesses in their reasoning, and they come to appreciate how emotions play a role in politics. They quickly discover that when their opponent can no longer find fault with their logic, the opponent will pivot to insults—and they’ll see that pivot objectively since they’re role-playing. It also helps them to see how empathy can be an effective tool in persuading others, which helps put a human face on political discussions.

I ask students to take notes on their discussions as they go, so they can discard reasoning that doesn’t hold up. If none of their reasons hold up, I tell them, they should rethink their position and feel free to switch sides.

This step also helps my students form a rebuttal. I have them take a fourth piece of paper and write the best argument against their opinion that they have heard—and then prove it wrong.

Creating a Rough Draft

I then tell them to use their notes as a rough draft for the body of their essay and to write an introduction that will draw readers in and a conclusion that readers will remember. Students work together in groups of two or three again to try out their ideas on each other. They write their ideas on two additional pieces of paper—one for their introduction and one for their conclusion.

Next, they assemble the pieces of their essay: They trim the excess paper from their six sheets (introduction, conclusion, three separate arguments with their supports, and a rebuttal) and arrange them in the order they think makes sense. I encourage them to experiment with the progression of their arguments, and with using their conclusion as an introduction and vice versa. They read each other's work and comment on the order of paragraphs in their classmates’ essays, ask questions, and suggest additional support for arguments. Once their paragraphs are in what they think is the best order, each student tapes them together to form a rough draft.

Before they type the final draft, we cover how using a thesaurus can help strengthen their language. Students work in small groups to find and highlight words or phrases in their rough drafts that might be weak or overused; then they use the thesaurus to experiment with different words that their imaginary audience will find engaging.

Good writing, I tell my students, doesn’t happen in a vacuum; input from anyone, including another student, can strengthen a draft. This is especially true for political essays and speeches, in which multiple writers often collaborate.

At the close of their political essay assignment, my Syrian students had more confidence in reading and writing in English, but they also had a newfound respect for the work of elected officials. Most important, they decided that our two nations should not only live together in peace but also work together to bring peace to a world that needs it—and that one day, they would achieve that dream.

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Politics and Education, Essay Example

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Social institutions surround us every day. Understanding the function and the role that it plays in everyday life is essential in understanding sociology. Recently there has been some debate to the diversity associated with school material. Today’s society is not simply just black and white, it is much more diverse. When school book picture white students they are forgetting to incorporate the African American, Hispanic, and Asian population as well. Education is not only about reading and writing it is about culture and life. The educational institutions provide social instructions by which we live our lives.  For example, if students are taught it is ok to take things from other students without permission, this action will continue as acceptable behavior.  The social functions of education keep society functioning from one generation to another. The educational institution does this by providing the students with the necessary tools to lead future generations. A very important function of preparing the future generations is education on differences. It is hard to open the eyes of other students when the white population is still the only one being depicted in the educational tools. Individual actions are determined by interactions with social institutions, these institutions are diverse in gender, race, and religious .beliefs to name a few. It is not only about education, but understanding, acceptance, and expectations.  The educational institution needs to evaluate how their tools are preparing individuals for their future in today’s society.

Politics is one of the most debated social institutions still to date.  The beauty of the social structure associated with America’s politics is the democracy by which it functions. With democracy comes great debate. In a majority rules institution every issue become arguable.  Politics is a social institutions used to implement structure. The campaigning, debates, and voting process is the structure set up to ensure that majority rules is implemented as stated. However, there are still issues associated with this social structure as well.  The 2000 elections opened the eyes of American’s to the potential issues associated.  Due to the close election, they audited the state of Florida, which was the deciding vote for Presidency. In doing so, there were many voters disqualified due to their names not being on the list. This changed the political structure and its intended functions. Current events associated with the political structure include immigration, gay rights, and health care. These debates are extremely significant in our society.  Again, like education society is no longer just black and white. These issues cause a lot of debate, negative comments; however, they are extremely relevant within this structure.  Right and wrong is based on majority rules.  That is how this structure was established, and it is how it is suppose to function.  As society evolves this issue will change and new debates will surface. That is how the political institution has been since the beginning of time.

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How to write an essay on political topics

Is a political essay your next challenge at a higher educational establishment? Do you like dealing with political essays? Some students adore disputing about modern government and political relationships between different countries. Even so, there is a category of students for whom any topic related to the behavior of politicians or political activity is just a first nightmare. If you are one of them, then you should make yourself familiar with our guidelines which will help you create powerful and effective political essays.

What You Should Consider Choosing a Topic

In sober fact, the success of your essay is contingent on the topic you select. Nevertheless, there is a category of students who adore writing and can creatively cover absolutely any theme. If you aren’t one of them and you only start developing your writing skills, you should think twice before you scope out a particular theme. Firstly, you need to bear in mind any theme you are going to develop in your essay should be based on proved facts. Otherwise stated, you need to select powerful resources and base your writing on them. The area of political science is very broad, and one particular theme can touch lots of other aspects as well. Secondly, it is better when the theme is well familiar to you. In this scenario, there are more chances that you will cover it successfully. Nevertheless, if you have a desire to explore the unfamiliar theme and you’ll bet you can cover it, you shouldn’t limit yourself. If you are a newbie in this area, you also shouldn’t take too broad topics. The length of an essay is usually limited. Thus, you won’t cover it! For that reason, it is better to prefer narrow themes.

What Problems Do Students Usually Face

As well as any other type of academic assignment , this one is also not easy (especially for newbies). Usually, students face the following challenges: • I haven’t the foggiest idea where to start and what argument I should cover first. • How to structurize the facts to create a clear and coherent argument? • How to air my opinion correctly? The key goal of our guideline is to help colleges get through all these issues and cope with this creative task productively.

Tips on Writing

Below, you can find several crucially important tips which will help you meet this challenge and create a worthy essay. In very deed, when you are aware of all aspects that should be taken into consideration, it will be easier to work on this task and focus on really significant things: • Organize your work. This is a key formula for success. When you finally received a topic from your teacher (or chose it by yourself), you should organize your thoughts and finally decide what aspects should be mentioned in your essay. • Sketch out an outline . This is just another step forward. In very deed, a brief outline will help you to form a clear idea of what you are going to mention. • Try to use simple terms to explain complicated notions. If this is a university or college essay, there is no need to use hard-hitting questions or notions. Following this recommendation, you will simplify your work. Your targeted audience will understand what you wanted to tell. • Form your opinion. This is the hidden purpose of any essay – to teach students to air their opinions regarding the given topic. This is an extremely useful skill which will help you build your career in the future. These simple essays allow you to form this habit. Writing a conclusion, you need to add a sophisticated opinion which supports your arguments.

Though political themes are very serious ones and this kind of assignment is not the place where you can show your sense of humor, you should try to stay creative! Your professor will immediately notice your creative manner of writing. Those works that have an original insight are more interesting than traditional ones!

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• Essay on Politics

Essay on Politics for Students in English

Politics is a hugely important domain in the world and it has a profound impact on the functioning as well as the policies of the governments. Politics has an effect on all types of government including democratic, autocratic, monarchical, theocratic and others. The government is responsible for making decisions on different matters of public interest, issuing orders for the public health, directing the citizens towards development and growth, and performing a wide range of other related functions.

There are numerous definitions of what politics means. Politics can be described as the disagreement between the various groups on what they like. One of the broad definitions of politics, which is widely agreed, is the art of governance. The government is the entity having the legal authority of regulating people’s actions. The word politics is usually used for defining how the countries are governed and how the governments make the rules and the laws. 

Defining laws and regulations that tell people what they can or cannot do is one of the ways in which the government leads the people. These regulations and laws are enacted by the government for ensuring order and protection in the society. Beyond the laws, the government might also regulate the citizens and the functioning of the country in other ways. Most of the countries have specific groups or political parties for expressing their views and policies. 

The political parties form a consensus on the common policies or path that they should take in communicating their ideas or policies to the people. These parties support legislative bills or reforms and the candidates based on the agenda agreed upon by the members. The election is usually contested or fought between the opposite political parties of different spectrum. 

One of the conventional explanations of politics refers to politics being conducted within the system of checks and balances for avoiding misuse of political power. The several institutions that exist within the governing system include the legislative body that is responsible for making laws, executive body that imposes them, and judiciary that interprets them thus providing a powerful and well-rounded political spectrum.

If you want to study in detail about politics and its various concepts of applications for your essay in English then you can refer to it on the Vedantu website or app. Vedantu is a leading learning platform with a wide range of learning resources, tutorials, solutions, reference notes, and sample questions papers with solutions for students of different branches.

Short Politics Essay in English

Politics, in general, is the platform by which people create, maintain, and change the laws that govern their lives. As a result, conflict and collaboration are inextricably connected in politics. On the one hand, the presence of conflicting views, competing expectations, competing needs, and competing interests is expected to result in conflict over the rules under which people live.

Politics is fascinating because everyone has a different perspective on life and its rules. They have differing opinions about how they should live. What money should go to whom? What is the best way to disperse power to help the powerless? Is it better for society to be built on collaboration or conflict? And so forth. They also talk about how such disputes can be resolved. What is the best way to make decisions as a group? In what conditions does who have a say? How much say should each person have in decisions? The list goes on.

This, according to Aristotle, made politics the "master science," which he described as "the action by which human beings strive to better their lives and build and contribute to a Good Society." Politics is, first and foremost, a social practice. It's still a conversation, but the parties have reduced it to a monologue.

Any effort to grasp the sense of the word "politics" must always grapple with two major issues. The first is the different connotations that this word has in everyday speech. Unlike economics, geography, history, and biology, which most people think of as academic subjects, few people approach politics without preconceptions. The second, more complicated issue is that even well-respected authorities cannot agree about what politics is all about. It has infiltrated nearly every aspect of society.

Hence, we can say that the exercise of authority, the sacred science of governance, the making of unified decisions, the distribution of limited resources, the art of deceit and exploitation, and so on are all terms used to describe politics.

FAQs on Essay on Politics

1. How do we define politics?

Politics is the collection of activities connected with community decision-making or other types of power relations between individuals, such as resource allocation or status.

2. Name the Various national-level political parties in india.

There are several national-level political parties in India. The major ones include:

All India Trinamool Congress(AITC)

Bahujan Samaj Party(BSP)

Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP)

Communist Party of India(CPI)

Communist Party of India(Marxist)

Indian National Congress(INC)

National People’s Party(NPP)

Nationalist Congress Party(NCP)

3. What is the definition of politics?

Politics has numerous definitions and explanations. In the basic broad term politics can be defined as the art of governance through a collection of activities that are associated with society, decision-making, and power relations between the individuals, like status or resource allocation. The concept of politics is very important in the governance of a country and it is an important topic related to public life that the students must learn about.

4.  Which are the different major political parties in India?

There are several major political parties in India. Some of these political parties include All India Trinamool Congress (AITMC), Indian National Congress (INC), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Communist Party of India (Marxist), Communist Party of India (CPI), and National People’s Party (NPP) amongst a host of others. Each of these political parties have their own political manifesto based on which they conduct their operations.

5. Why is politics an important subject for students to learn?

Politics is related to day-to-day functioning of a country or a society and thus it is important for students to learn and be well informed about it. Politics includes vital policies and decisions that have a direct impact on people and as a responsible citizen it is crucial for students to have a basic grasp of developments in the country that charts out the future path of the nation.

6. How can I prepare for an essay on politics?

If you want to write an essay on politics then you would need to prepare well by understanding the definitions and various other aspects related to politics. One of the ways you can do this is by learning and reading about politics on the internet. You can also find a detailed essay on politics for students in English at Vedantu. This essay incorporates all the important points and provides an excellent guide on how the essay should be done.

7. How can I download the English essay on politics from Vedantu?

If you want to download the English essay on Politics provided by Vedantu then you can do it from either the website or the app. All you need to do is go to the English section and browse to the essay on politics. Here you will have the “Download PDF” option and you just need to click on that button to download the English essay by Vedantu on your device for free. Once you downloaded the PDF file you can access it offline any time you want.

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How Level of Education Affects Political Party Affiliation

This essay about the complex link between education and political allegiance explores how education shapes political perspectives and societal norms. It highlights the dual role of education as both a force for empowerment and a perpetuator of existing social hierarchies. The text examines the challenges faced by marginalized groups in educational settings and discusses the politicization of education in shaping political loyalty. Ultimately, it portrays education as a transformative power in society, despite the complexities and challenges it presents.

How it works

In the intricate web of political dynamics, the interplay between education and party allegiance forms a captivating narrative often sidelined in mainstream discussions. Embedded within this narrative is a tale of how individual trajectories of political loyalty are not simply the result of chance encounters, but are sculpted by the profound impact of educational journeys on personal perspectives and societal norms. As we venture into this complex relationship, we unravel a tapestry woven with diverse influences, motivations, and paradoxes that resist simplistic explanations.

At the heart of this exploration lies the transformative influence of education in shaping minds and molding ideologies. Beyond its role in disseminating information, education acts as a crucible for critical thinking, nurturing an ethos of inquiry and providing individuals with the analytical tools to navigate the intricate terrain of politics. Whether in the esteemed corridors of academia or the informal classrooms of life, the pursuit of knowledge opens avenues to fresh viewpoints and challenges entrenched convictions, laying the groundwork for nuanced political participation.

Yet, within this odyssey of intellectual evolution lies a paradoxical interplay between privilege and progress. While education promises upward mobility and empowerment, it also mirrors and perpetuates existing social hierarchies. Prestigious institutions, cloaked in ivy and steeped in tradition, often act as guardians of privilege, predominantly catering to the affluent and well-connected. Consequently, the educational journey becomes not just a quest for enlightenment but also a reflection of socio-economic status, with access to quality education reinforcing existing inequalities and influencing political affiliations.

Furthermore, the nexus between education and political loyalty is further complicated by the intersectionality of identities and experiences. For marginalized communities navigating the educational landscape, the pursuit of knowledge is rife with hurdles and systemic impediments. Whether confronting racial biases in admissions or grappling with Eurocentric curricula that marginalize their histories, marginalized students must navigate a maze of challenges that shape their political consciousness in profound ways. Thus, while education may serve as a catalyst for societal transformation, its impact is tempered by the realities of power and privilege entrenched within educational institutions.

Moreover, the politicization of education itself adds another layer of intricacy to the relationship between education and political allegiance. In an era marked by ideological polarization and culture clashes, debates over curriculum content, academic freedom, and the role of education in shaping national identity have become battlegrounds for competing visions of society. Political factions seize upon these debates to advance their agendas, wielding education as a tool for indoctrination rather than enlightenment. Consequently, individuals may find themselves aligning with political parties not solely based on their educational attainment, but also on their stance on educational issues and knowledge dissemination.

Yet, amidst these convolutions and contradictions, one undeniable truth persists: education stands as a potent force for change and metamorphosis. Whether through formal schooling or informal learning experiences, the pursuit of knowledge unlocks doors to new vistas, challenges entrenched ideologies, and empowers individuals to craft their destinies. Thus, while the relationship between education and political allegiance may be fraught with complexities and contingencies, it ultimately mirrors the enduring quest for enlightenment and societal advancement that defines the human journey.

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Political Science Essay Topics

Get Inspired by 200 Political Science Essay Topic Ideas

15 min read

Published on: May 8, 2023

Last updated on: Jan 31, 2024

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Political science is a fascinating and ever-evolving field that seeks to understand the complex workings of politics. As a student of political science, writing essays on political science topics can be an excellent way to deepen your knowledge.

But finding an excellent topic for your essay is often the most difficult part. Don’t worry if you’re stuck at choosing a topic - delve into our list of topics to find inspiration!

In this blog, we've compiled a list of almost 200 political science essay topics. This list covers a wide range of topics and subfields within political science. These thought-provoking essay topics will inspire you to explore new ideas and develop a deeper understanding of the subject. 

So let’s delve into it!

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Public Policy and Administration Essay Topics

• The role of public policy in promoting sustainable development.
• An analysis of the impact of social media on public policy decision-making.
• The challenges of implementing public policy in diverse cultural contexts.
• A comparative study of public healthcare policies in different countries.
• The role of public-private partnerships in promoting economic development.
• An evaluation of the effectiveness of public policy in addressing climate change.
• The impact of globalization on public policy and administration.
• The challenges of balancing individual rights and public safety in policy-making.
• An analysis of the role of bureaucracy in public policy administration.
• The ethical challenges facing public policy decision-makers and administrators.

Political Theory and Political Philosophy Essay Topics

• The concept of justice in political philosophy
• The views on power in political philosophy
• The relationship between democracy and capitalism in political theory.
• The role of civil disobedience in democratic societies: a philosophical perspective.
• The relationship between individual freedom and social responsibility in political theory.
• The role of the state in ensuring social justice in modern democracies.
• A critical analysis of the concept of sovereignty.
• The relationship between ethics and politics in the work of Aristotle.
• A comparative study of the political thought of Plato and Machiavelli.
• Feminist political theory and its role in promoting gender equality in democratic societies.

Comparative Politics Essay Topics 

• What are the different electoral systems used in democratic countries?
• The role of political parties in democratic governance: a comparative analysis.
• The impact of religion on politics in different countries: a comparative study.
• The challenges of democratic consolidation in transitional societies: a comparative perspective.
• A comparative analysis of the welfare state in different countries.
• The role of civil society in democratic governance: a comparative study.
• A comparative study of the political systems of federal and unitary states.
• The impact of historical legacies on contemporary political systems: a comparative analysis.
• A comparative analysis of the parliamentary and presidential systems of government.
• The impact of globalization on political systems: a comparative study.

Political Economy Essay Topics

• The impact of globalization on economic inequality: a critical analysis.
• The role of the state in economic development: a comparative study.
• A comparative study of capitalist and socialist economic systems.
• The relationship between economic growth and environmental sustainability.
• The impact of technological innovation on economic development.
• The role of multinational corporations in shaping global economic governance.
• A comparative study of the economic policies of different political regimes.
• The impact of financialization on the global economy.
• The relationship between trade liberalization and economic growth: a critical analysis.
• The role of international organizations in shaping global economic governance.

American Politics and Government Essay Topics

• The impact of political polarization on American democracy.
• Government influence in the economics of the US.
• Culture wars as the most important political issue in contemporary United States
• The challenges of federalism in a diverse and complex society.
• A critical analysis of the role of interest groups in American politics.
• The impact of media on American politics and public opinion.
• A comparative study of the voting systems used in different American states.
• The role of the Electoral College in American presidential elections.
• The impact of money on American politics: a case study of a recent election.
• A critical analysis of the role of the Constitution in shaping American politics and society.

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International Relations and Diplomacy Essay Topics

• The impact of globalization on international relations.
• A comparative study of the foreign policies of major powers.
• The role of diplomacy in conflict resolution: a case study of a recent conflict.
• The impact of economic interdependence on international relations.
• The role of international law and diplomacy in global governance.
• The role of the United Nations in promoting international peace and security.
• The role of soft power in shaping international relations
• The impact of nationalism on international relations. 
• The relationship between technology and diplomacy in the 21st century.
• The threat of nuclear weapons and nuclear war

Essay Topics About Regional Politics

• How has the European Union navigated the challenges posed by Brexit and the rise of right-wing populism?
• What role does the African Union play in promoting regional integration and economic development on the continent?
• How successful has ECOWAS been in promoting peace and security in West Africa?
• What challenges does ASEAN face in promoting economic integration and regional cooperation in Southeast Asia?
• How has SAARC contributed to regional stability and economic development in South Asia?
• What impact has the BRICS group had on global economic governance and geopolitics?
• What are the implications of China's increasing influence in the Asia-Pacific region for regional stability and security?
• How have the member states of Caricom worked together to promote economic integration and development in the Caribbean?
• The evolution of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and its role in the Middle East?
• How have regional organizations and powers responded to the COVID-19 pandemic, and what lessons can be learned from their experiences?

Political Science Education and Career Essay Topics

• The benefits of studying political science for a career in public service.
• The job prospects for political science graduates.
• The impact of technology on the future of political science careers.
• A comparative analysis of political science programs offered by different universities.
• The role of internships in preparing political science students for a career in public service.
• Diversity and inclusion in political science education and careers.
• The salaries and benefits of political science professionals.
• The role of professional associations in supporting political science education and careers.
• The skills required for a successful career in political science.
• The impact of globalization on political science education and careers.

Essay Topics About Political Parties and Elections 

• The impact of financial influence in politics on democratic elections.
• The role of political parties in shaping democratic elections.
• The impact of social media on political campaigns and elections.
• A critical analysis of voter suppression in recent elections.
• The role of interest groups in shaping election outcomes.
• A comparative study of primary election systems used in different states.
• The impact of political advertising on voter behavior.
• A critical analysis of the role of political action committees in shaping election outcomes.
• The impact of gerrymandering on democratic representation.
• The role of charismatic leadership in elections

Essay Topics About Political Ideologies

• An analysis of the major political ideologies: liberalism, conservatism, socialism, and fascism.
• The role of ideology in shaping public policy.
• A critical analysis of the relationship between democracy and different political ideologies.
• The impact of globalization on the spread of political ideologies.
• A comparative analysis of feminist and gender-based political ideologies.
• The role of religion in shaping political ideologies.
• A critical analysis of the intersection of race and political ideologies.
• A study of the political ideologies behind different social movements.
• The role of political ideologies in shaping political parties and elections.
• The impact of political ideologies on political violence and terrorism.

Essay Topics About Human Rights and Justice

• A critical analysis of the role of international law in promoting human rights and justice.
• The impact of globalization on human rights and justice.
• A comparative study of the human rights and justice systems in different countries.
• The role of the United Nations in promoting human rights and justice.
• A critical analysis of the intersection of human rights and social justice movements.
• The impact of human rights abuses on democratic governance.
• The role of civil society organizations in promoting human rights and justice.
• A comparative study of restorative and retributive justice systems.
• The impact of technology on the promotion and protection of human rights.
• The role of the media in promoting human rights and justice.

Essay Topics About Gender and Politics

• Representation of women in politics in different countries.
• The impact of gender on voting behavior and political participation.
• A critical analysis of the intersection of race and gender in politics.
• The role of gender in shaping public policy.
• A comparative analysis of the political representation of women in different regions.
• The impact of social media on the gendered nature of political discourse.
• A critical analysis of the gendered dimensions of political violence and conflict.
• The role of gender in shaping political leadership styles.
• A comparative study of the impact of gender quotas on political representation.
• The role of feminist movements in shaping political agendas.

Essay Topics About Environmental Politics

• The impact of climate change on global politics.
• The role of international organizations in shaping environmental policies.
• A comparative study of the environmental policies of different countries.
• The impact of environmental policies on economic development.
• The relationship between environmental justice and social justice.
• The role of civil society organizations in shaping environmental policies.
• Market-based vs command-and-control environmental policies.
• The impact of the media on shaping public opinion on environmental issues.
• A critical analysis of the relationship between environmental politics and global governance.
• The role of science in shaping environmental policies.

Essay Topics About Media and Politics 

• The role of media in shaping political discourse.
• The impact of social media on political communication and participation.
• A comparative analysis of media systems and their impact on political outcomes.
• The role of media in shaping public opinion and electoral outcomes.
• An analysis of the relationship between media ownership and political bias.
• The impact of fake news and disinformation on political processes and outcomes.
• A comparative study of media regulation in different countries.
• The role of investigative journalism in holding political leaders accountable.
• The impact of media consolidation on political diversity and representation.
• The relationship between media and democracy.

Essay Topics About Political Culture and Identity

• The relationship of political culture on democratic governance.
• The role of cultural identities in shaping political behavior.
• The impact of cultural diversity on political processes and outcomes.
• A critical analysis of the role of nationalism in shaping political identities.
• The impact of populism on political culture and identity.
• The role of gender and sexuality in shaping political identities.
• A critical analysis of the relationship between religion and politics.
• The impact of migration on cultural identities and political participation.
• The role of art and culture in shaping political identity and activism.
• The relationship between language and political identity.

Essay Topics About Political Geography and Geopolitics

• A study of the impact of geography on political boundaries and territorial disputes.
• A comparative analysis of political systems in different regions of the world.
• The impact of natural resources on geopolitical relations and conflicts.
• A critical analysis of the role of global institutions in shaping geopolitical outcomes.
• The impact of infrastructure development on geopolitical relations.
• A comparative study of the influence of colonialism on modern political geography.
• The role of geography in shaping economic development policies.
• The impact of migration on political geography and geopolitics.
• The impact of climate change on political geography and geopolitics.
• The role of technological innovation in shaping political geography and geopolitics.

Essay About Political Leadership and Decision-making

• A critical analysis of the qualities and characteristics of effective political leaders.
• The impact of leadership styles on decision-making in politics.
• A comparative analysis of leadership styles and their impact on political outcomes.
• The role of emotions and intuition in political decision-making.
• The relationship between power and leadership in politics.
• The impact of charismatic leadership on political influence.
• The decision-making process in crisis situations in politics.
• The role of communication skills in effective political leadership and decision-making.
• A comparative analysis of the decision-making process in democratic and authoritarian systems.
• The rise of global populist leadership.

Essay Topics About War and Peace

• The causes and consequences of war in the modern era.
• The effectiveness of different conflict resolution mechanisms.
• The role of international law in regulating armed conflicts and promoting peace.
• The role of peacekeeping operations in managing conflicts.
• The impact of new technologies on the dynamics of modern warfare.
• A comparative study of different approaches to peacebuilding and their effectiveness.
• The role of diplomacy in preventing and resolving conflicts.
• A study of the relationship between economic interdependence and peace.
• The role of media in shaping public perceptions of war and peace.
• The impact of environmental factors on the risk of conflict and the prospects for peace.

Political Argumentative Essay Topics

• Should the United Nations have the authority to intervene in sovereign nations to prevent human rights abuses?
• Is democracy the best form of government, or are there other viable alternatives?
• Should the government have the right to regulate free speech in order to protect against hate speech and incitement to violence?
• To what extent should the government be involved in regulating the economy?
• Should the electoral college be abolished in favor of a popular vote for presidential elections?
• Is democracy the ideal political system for every country in the world?
• Should political candidates be required to release their tax returns in order to run for office?
• Is political correctness a threat to free speech and academic freedom?
• Should the government be responsible for ensuring access to affordable healthcare for all citizens?
• Should the right to bear arms be protected, or should gun ownership be more strictly regulated for public safety?

Political Science Persuasive Essay Topics

• The government should provide universal healthcare to all citizens.
• Elected officials should be required to disclose their financial interests and conflicts of interest.
• Renewable energy sources should be prioritized over fossil fuels to combat climate change.
• The electoral college should be abolished in favor of a popular vote for presidential elections.
• Voter ID laws should be eliminated to ensure fair and equal access to the ballot box.
• The United States should increase its investment in education and reduce its military spending.
• The minimum wage should be raised to a living wage in order to combat poverty.
• The United States should adopt a policy of open borders and allow for more immigration.
• The government should regulate social media platforms to combat the spread of misinformation and hate speech.
• The United States should take a more active role in combating human rights abuses and promoting democracy around the world.

How to Choose a Political Science Topic for Your Essay

Now that you have read some good political science essay topic ideas, you must be wondering which one to choose. This is because with so many options to choose from, it can be overwhelming to find the right topic.

Here are some tips to help you choose a topic:

• Choose a Topic that Interests you: 

It is essential to choose a topic that you are passionate about. This will make the research and writing process more enjoyable and engaging. 

• Do Your Research: 

Conduct preliminary research on each of your potential topics to see if there is enough literature and data available. You can use academic databases, books, and reputable websites to gather information.

• Consider your Audience: 

Think about your audience and what they might find interesting and relevant. Choose a topic that is not only relevant to your course but also to the broader political context.

• Narrow Down your Focus: 

Once you have a list of potential topics, narrow them down to a few that are more specific and manageable. You can do this by asking yourself questions such as, "What is the purpose of my essay?" and "What is my main argument?"

• Keep it Relevant: 

Choose a topic that is current and relevant to the present political landscape or the course you are studying. This will help keep your essay engaging and informative.

• Consult with your Instructor: 

Finally, if you are unsure about your topic or have questions about the assignment, don't hesitate to consult with your instructor. They can offer valuable insights and advice on how to approach your topic and structure your essay.

To Wrap it Up,

Political science is a fascinating field that offers a lot of topics for students to study. It's important to choose a topic that is both interesting to you and relevant to the course material. 

With the list of 200 essay topics provided above, you can get an inspiration for your own essay. Moreover, by following the tips for choosing a topic, you can narrow down your options to find a manageable and engaging topic.

Struggling with your political science essay? Our expert essay helpers are here to assist you every step of the way. Trust our political science essay writing service to deliver top-notch papers tailored to your needs.

And for an even smoother writing experience, don't forget to explore our AI essay writer tool .

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Essays About Politics: Top 5 Examples and 7 Writing Prompts

Essays about politics address delicate and intriguing matters. See our top essay examples and prompts you can incorporate into your writing.

Politics encompasses movements and ideas that aim to control and encourage progress. It attempts to run a country through relevant developments and efficient governance. Though it started in the 19th century , it’s also the root of many disputes. Because of its complexity, politics is a famous essay topic coaxing writers to be open-minded and wise. It’s also an extensive subject to tackle.

5 Best Essay Examples

1. the impact of media on teens’ views on politics by anonymous on gradesfixer.com, 2. the problem of gun politics in the united states by anonymous on papersowl.com, 3. education: controversial issue in florida politics by anonymous on ivypanda.com, 4. the politics of modern day abortion in jamaica by anonymous on ivypanda.com, 5. the importance of public awareness in politics by anonymous on gradesfixer.com, 1. the role of a politician, 2. why do we need political parties, 3. qualifications of a good politician, 4. the effect of having uneducated politicians , 5. social media and political campaigns, 6. politics and corruption, 7. if i were a politician….

“With the spike in internet usage and the rapid spread of thoughts and ideas, the effect on the human psyche comes into question. Applications like Instagram and Twitter have a “Like-Button” that acts as a representation for interest and has created an uproar on the need for attention amongst teens.”

The author examines the different media released online that are easily accessible to young people and how these contents receive engagement through likes and comments. The essay talks about government officials with social media accounts and how their simple posts can instantly change a teen’s view about politics. The piece also includes statistics on teens’ participation in these networking sites, the elections, and the effects of teens on politics.

“Every day 39 children and teens are shot and survive, 31 injured in an attack, 1 survives a suicide attempt and 7 shot unintentionally. Not only is the 2nd amendment giving access to guns to protect ourselves, it is giving others access to commit violent crimes that involve a firearm. Guns are not just used to have protection against harm, but it is also used to create dangerous scenarios out in the public.”

The essay delves into gun politics problems for US citizens. It mentions how bearing guns give people easy access to heinous acts such as mass shootings and suicides. The writer offers relevant statistics to demonstrate how severe the situation is, citing people who die or get injured from gun violence. At the end of the piece, the author says that they believe the 2nd amendment isn’t for protection but for crimes and violence.

“Some schools are already implementing full-time education, while others are not ready to accept students in person. Undoubtedly, this can still be dangerous for all stakeholders, but the state does not have a definite policy in this regard. Nevertheless, online education also comes with some challenges. It is difficult for teachers to maintain the required level of quality of distance learning.”

The essay focuses on Florida’s politics and how it affects the state’s educational system. Even after the pandemic’s peak, some Florida schools still struggle to implement policies that may help their schooling structure. The author also mentions that these institutions do not prioritize students’ mental health and don’t take racism seriously, which leads to high suicide rates and violence.

“Currently Jamaica maintains one of the most unique positions, with abortion being illegal officially, but still performed as part of the status quo in particular situations. The discussion around abortion in Jamaica is inherently complex, stemming from colonial influences on modern sociopolitical and religious perspectives.

The author shares their opinion about Jamaica’s political view on abortion and the protection of women. Abortion is illegal in Jamaica. However, some still do it by paying medical professionals handsomely. Abortion is a complex issue in Jamaica, as there are many things politicians need to consider before coming up with a solution. Although this topic still needs a lengthy discussion, the author believes there is a massive opportunity for change as people gradually forget the traditional beliefs about abortion.

“It’s imperative to get involved with politics so people can get educated and grasp their own opinion instead of listening to others. These aspects are vital to the understanding of how the government works and how a citizen of America will shape the country.”

The writer explains that being aware of politics is key to voting correctly during elections. Moreover, they say that involving young people in politics will help with the structure of the laws in the country. This is because understanding politics and governance yourself is better than believing others’ opinions, mainly when the country’s future depends on this framework.

Tip: If writing an essay sounds like a lot of work, simplify it. Write a simple 5 paragraph essay instead. 

7 Prompts on Essays About Politics

List the duties and responsibilities of a politician running the country. Then, add your opinion on whether your country’s politicians are successfully fulfilling their duties. You can also discuss whether politicians are necessary for a country to thrive.

Political parties are groups of people sharing the same political ideas. They usually band together and support each other in hopes of earning the public’s trust. They also help shape the opinions and decision-making of the citizens on who to vote for. Use this prompt to discuss why political parties are essential in a government, give examples, and add some of their principles. You might also be interested in our guide on the best books about American politics .

Everyone can be a politician. But to be good at their job, they must have an excellent educational background and character to manage the country’s issues and its citizens. Identify and explain each qualification. You can also add events or names of politicians considered good at their jobs. 

Education is a right for everyone in most countries, and so does having educated politicians. An uneducated politician can’t successfully run a nation because they lack the knowledge to discern what’s best for different segments of the economy, etc. As a result, they tend to make wrong decisions and affect citizens’ political behavior. Discuss the risks of giving uneducated politicians government positions and add previous incidents to support your claims.

Social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are utilized to spread information, including political campaigns. A single post from a knowledgeable person across these three platforms can change a silent reader’s mindset about a particular political party. This prompt explains how politicians use social media in today’s political campaigning. You can also add the dangers of immediately believing viral posts online. 

Politics is also concerned with managing budgets to improve infrastructures and institutions. However, because it involves large sums of money, corruption is also rampant. Use this prompt to explain how corruption happens within the government, including the measures used to stop it. You can add statistics about the most and least corrupt countries. Then, add examples or scenarios to make your essay more interesting.

Being a politician is not easy because you’ll have to consider not only yourself and your family but the welfare of many in every decision you make. Use this prompt to share what you want to focus on if you are a politician. For example, you’ll pay more attention to education so the youth can have a better future.

For help with your essays, check out our round-up of the best essay checkers.

Maria Caballero is a freelance writer who has been writing since high school. She believes that to be a writer doesn't only refer to excellent syntax and semantics but also knowing how to weave words together to communicate to any reader effectively.

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Impacts of politics in education

I believe the impact of politics in education comes positively this time because previously, scenario was worst in the country. When any election comes, all students used to miss the class and dedicate entirely in election but the perception of student has changed. Now students are aware about their academics rather than the election only, and it’s really a positive trend of them. But in flip part they need to understand the scenario of the country’s politics and make their positive participation in politics. This will bring further positive impact on development.

Prof, Dr. Pradip Bahadur Neupane

Tri-Chandra Multiple Campus  

If we see from positive angle, politics affects positively in education.  Youths are the biggest prospect of development of change so I believe when political knowledge germinates in them, country will follow the path of proportional development .   Education is the gateway of prosperity so, until and unless, we should try to give best to education through politics.

Nirmala Kumari Suwal

Ratna Rajjya Campus

There are both positive and negative of politics in education. If politics used as a tool to address the challenges in education sector through the youth voice then it’s very much healthy. But we can see some bad trends of using politics negatively in the entire sector, so it comes in same way in education too. I believe that, political educationis primary need of us. We all need to contribute from our side to make good impact of politics in education.

Prof. Dr. Madhav Pd.  Gautam

Patan Multiple Campus

Students voice: Impacts of politics in education

In the present context of Nepal, students must be familiar with the ongoing changes in the political scenario. However, school students should be kept far from politics. Whereas college students may participate in the political events. yes, most of us think that if students get involved in politics, wont it harm their studies? Politics helps students to groom themselves.it enhances their leadership ability. Politics motivates students for making critical analysis of issues. Politics is not only about making arguments regarding political parties, it’s about making impactful influences in the society.

Kopila Deuja

BSC fourth Year

Tri Chandra Multiple Campus

To make a better country for future generation political knowledge is very important to youths. Politics these days is not marching in positive direction but to direct it youth should be in politics but not  by harming their academics. If students are aware about the career and politics less impact may be seen in education. I guess it’s entirely depends upon the student how he reacts into the political scenario.  And its high time that the intellectual minds of students must focus on the future roadmap of Nepal. Let’s rise!

Archana Ghimire

BSC fourth year

Wish I could applaud our government for its positive influence, but its negative impacts fill my mind. Riots down the street every day, clearly shows how unstable our political condition is and owing to this, the educational sector of the nation is adversely affected.

Students are the most vulnerable group to the harsh political wind blowing throughout the nation where academic calendar seems to shorten every year as Bandha leaves the classrooms empty.

When students divide into unions under the political influences, hundreds of dreams are crushed with delayed exams where talent is overshadowed by the so called "kith and kin policy". The political leaders condemn the education system in every speech they deliver: but do they really don't know who the real culprits are? 

Education is not just a word to be used to make those manifestos promising, but a foundation of a nation change where every individual works for a shared aim; the nations development. 

Politics has turned to be very toxic for our education system. It's high time we question ourselves " Those faces covered by a mask of nationality...do they really care? " 

Sabigya Pant

Ace Institute of Management

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Rick Hess Straight Up

Education policy maven Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute think tank offers straight talk on matters of policy, politics, research, and reform. Read more from this blog.

Where Do Democrats Stand on Education?

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The politics of education today look very different from those of the Bush-Obama years, when Democrats for Education Reform got its start. The bipartisan consensus that informed policies like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top has given way to a polarized environment. What’s that mean for would-be school reformers, especially in the shadow of a presidential contest between two hugely unpopular candidates? I thought I’d reach out to Jorge Elorza, the CEO of DFER and a former two-term mayor of Providence, R.I., to get his take on the Democratic agenda, school choice, and the education landscape. Here’s what he had to say.

Rick: You took the reins of DFER last year after eight years as mayor of Providence. What’s struck you most in this new role?

Jorge: What has struck me the most is the extent of the crisis in public education and the lack of urgency among political leaders to address it. Public education is the bedrock of opportunity in America, but too many of our academic institutions are simply not making the grade. Kids are not getting the equitable opportunities they deserve—and there is too little being done to change this. This inaction is especially concerning given the profound and lasting impact of the pandemic on our education system. The need for urgent, transformative solutions has never been clearer; hence, our focus on getting more Democratic leaders to prioritize bold, evidence-based education policies.

Rick: As you know, there are those on the left who’ve long attacked DFER for being insufficiently progressive. How do you respond to such critics? And, in the same vein, can you say a few words about just why you’re a Democrat?

Jorge: We’ve always believed that DFER’s mission aligns well with core progressive values. We believe that low-income and Black and brown families should have the same access to high-quality education options as families with means. However, being hyperfocused on kids and families, as opposed to the adults in the system, has led some folks to criticize us. I’m a Democrat because, compared to Republicans, I’ve always believed that the party at least tries to look out for the little guy. On education, we still have a lot of work to do!

Rick: DFER was founded nearly 20 years ago, back when education reform was riding high and DFER could lean on celebrities like New York City schools Chancellor Joel Klein and D.C. chief Michelle Rhee. How are things different today?

Jorge: Today, DFER operates in a political landscape that is not as open to fundamental education reform as it once was. Many folks have even pronounced education reform dead. But I think that assessment is awfully wrong. It is true that many philanthropists and political leaders have turned away from ed. reform, but the desire for choice among the public is about as high as it has ever been. Our message to the Democratic Party is that the choice-vs.-no-choice debate has been settled among voters. Choice won. We must embrace choice in a form that aligns with Democratic values and we are calling for the party to embrace public school choice as the cornerstone of its education agenda.

Rick: When DFER was launched, there was substantial support for measures like charter schools and other forms of school choice in the Democratic Party. But as you note, that’s less true today, at least among the policy elite. How has that altered DFER’s role?

Jorge: The political landscape has indeed shifted, and elected leaders have moved away from our issues. Ten years ago, voters trusted Democrats on education far more than they trusted Republicans—in fact, Democrats held a double-digit advantage over Republicans on voters’ trust on education. Today, that advantage is gone. To put it bluntly, voters no longer see Democrats as the party of education. Our outreach to the party makes the case that embracing an ambitious ed. reform agenda is not only good policy but also good politics. With elections as tight as they are, every issue matters. We want to make sure that Democrats lead on education policy once again.

Rick: As you well know, when it comes to school choice today, polling suggests a stark split between college-educated progressives, who are skeptical, and rank-and-file Democrats, who tend to be supportive. How are you navigating that tension?

Jorge: This is an interesting moment for Democrats as they become more attuned to the fact that low-income Black and Latino voters are drifting away from them. Education can and should be part of the message that brings independents and traditional rank-and-file Democrats back into the fold. We believe that voters support high-quality education options because . . . of course they do! Once folks have seen that they can have high-quality options to choose from, they naturally want more of them. Hence, we believe Democrats should embrace an education policy that emphasizes a broad menu of public school options.

Rick: Where does DFER stand on testing and educational accountability today?

Jorge: Strong accountability standards have always been a core policy pillar of ours. Without accountability, it’s hard to improve our education systems. We also support standardized testing because it is a tool to measure progress and hold schools accountable for serving their students. In fact, unlike in the NCLB era, we believe that not enough is being done to provide opportunities to students in the lowest-performing schools, either by fundamentally revamping those schools or by offering students new and better options in the public system. We are working to change that.

Rick: Could you say a bit about DFER’s approach when it comes to promoting the science of reading?

Jorge: We believe America should launch a moonshot goal of getting every child to read at grade level by 3rd grade by 2030. We advocate comprehensive reforms, beginning with teacher training and continuing through curriculum selection and professional development. Growth in states like Mississippi demonstrates that transformation is possible and underscores the bipartisan nature of this issue. Governor Wes Moore’s decision to appoint Carey Wright, a leader in Mississippi’s successful reading reforms, to head Maryland’s literacy efforts further emphasizes the universality of the goal.

Rick: How do you think President Biden has performed in light of the DFER agenda?

Jorge: President Biden showed tremendous leadership by investing historic sums in education to address COVID-related learning loss. We applaud him for that. However, his administration has lacked a clear K–12 reform agenda, which raises questions about what they want their education legacy to be. The politics of education are hard. That said, we’d like to see the administration champion K–12 policies that require a certain measure of political courage. We are hopeful that in a second term, students and families will have as much political influence as the adults have now.

Rick: That said, in response to the administration’s proposed fiscal 2025 budget, you released a pretty forceful statement , declaring, “The administration’s cuts to public school choice give the least consideration to the very communities the president needs the most. It not only hurts students, it hurts the president’s re-election chances.” Can you say a bit more about the proposed cuts and the political consequences that concern you?

Jorge: What we were driving home with that statement was the fact that cuts to the federal Charter Schools Program, or CSP, directly oppose what so many families are telling us they want for their kids. Families have been clearly saying they need more opportunities for innovative educational pathways; public charter schools provide exactly that. We were cautioning the administration that ignoring the wishes of these families—these voters—potentially jeopardizes its electoral prospects. I am pleased to see that since that statement, Biden has signed into law the congressional spending package, which flat-funds, rather than cuts, CSP. We will, however, continue to urge Congress to increase funding for CSP to $500 million and hope to see this in the future.

Rick: Looking at the education landscape as a whole, how do you think about the role of DFER in 2024?

Jorge: There are a limitless number of important issues in education today, but DFER’s North Star has always been “results for kids.” We will continue to focus on a practical, evidence-based, results-driven approach to education policy. Despite all of the progress we’ve seen over the years, too many school systems are still falling woefully short of where they need to be—and in the process, lives are being lost. There is a crisis in public education, and we need to bring widespread attention to it. You can expect us to speak with a heightened sense of urgency on this issue.

Rick: Final question: Looking forward, what are you most optimistic about when it comes to school improvement?

Jorge: As they say, you should never let a good crisis go to waste. I believe the changing political dynamics will force Democrats to take education policy more seriously again. In my opinion, there is no major policy area in America that lends itself to broad bipartisan support more than public school choice. Once Democrats fully embrace it, I believe two things will happen: Education policies will be bolder, and Democrats will lead on education again.

The opinions expressed in Rick Hess Straight Up are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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5 ways AI can help you study for finals - for free

Regardless of major, academic level, or institution, final periods are stressful for students, requiring intense studying and cramming. However, AI can help ease the load. 

Since  generative AI  first surged in popularity, the technology has typically received a bad rap in the education sector, with many believing it would violate academic standards and integrity. However, AI can also be a great assistant capable of helping students optimize their studying.

Also: 7 reasons I use Copilot instead of ChatGPT

The best generative AI tools, such as AI chatbots , are intuitive to use, requiring no knowledge of coding or AI, and many of the most helpful features are free. If you're ready to hand off some tedious studying tasks to AI, I rounded up the best ways you can use AI to study for finals. 

Quick Note: For any of the below tips that include AI chatbots, you can use whichever one you choose, and there are plenty of options to pick from, which we break down here . For the examples below, I used Microsoft Copilot because the free version is connected to the internet, allowing the chatbot to access the latest information on the web, which is crucial for getting accurate information when studying. 

1. Summarize PDFs 

Earning a degree often involves lots of readings, usually in the form of lengthy PDFs. Whether you are a humanities or STEM major, you will be required to read or familiarize yourself with research papers that are loaded with technical jargon and hard to parse through. That's where AI PDF summarizers can help. 

With AI PDF summarizers, you can input your PDF from your computer's files and conversationally ask the AI chatbot to answer any questions about the topic or even generate entire summaries for you. 

Also: How to use ChatPDF: The AI chatbot that can tell you everything about your PDF

There are various different tools you can use to accomplish this task, with the most intuitive being ChatPDF . The free version of ChatPDF allows users to upload two PDFs daily, each up to 120 pages. Using it is easy as all you have to do is visit the site, upload your document, and start chatting away. 

Some free AI chatbots, such as Anthropic's Claude , can accept document inputs and accomplish the same goal. The premium version of OpenAI's chatbot, ChatGPT Plus , can also accept document input but the subscription costs $20 per month. 

2. Break down material 

Sometimes, no matter how many times you read or study certain material, it simply doesn't click. In those instances, you can use an AI chatbot to break down complex terms for you into more digestible parts. 

Also: The best free AI courses (and whether AI certificates are worth it)

For example, you can input a sentence or broader concept you don't understand and ask the chatbot to explain it to a level that would make the material more understandable. My go-to is, "Explain XYZ as if I were a five-year-old," as you can see in the photo below. 

This feature is so useful that I use it often in my everyday workflow. All it does is break the subject using everyday tangible examples and adding context that makes the material much more accessible, cutting through confusing and technical terminology. You can pick any age or grade level you'd like. 

3. Assist with essay prep

As if cramming a semester's worth of material for an exam wasn't difficult enough, many professors also assign end-of-semester papers that either replace or supplement your final exam. Because of how much they are weighted in terms of your grade, they often require high levels of synthesis and research. That's where AI can help. 

You use it for support when writing, including creating outlines for essays, finding sources for you, and brainstorming essay ideas.   

Also: How ChatGPT (and other AI chatbots) can help you write an essay

To have an AI chatbot help out with any of these tasks, all you would have to do is ask it to do so conversationally, such as, "Help me create an outline for an essay regarding the rise and fall of The Wiggles." 

You can also leverage AI chatbots' advanced natural language processing to co-edit essays for you. Unlike your standard spell-check, AI chatbots can understand context, flow, conciseness, and more, making it a superior editor. Just copy and paste your text and ask the chatbot to edit for whatever focus you'd like. 

4. Outline your notes 

In preparation for exams, you have the difficult task of looking through a semester's worth of notes and condensing them to the most important highlights for studying. Instead of doing that yourself, you can ask an AI chatbot to summarize or organize your notes for you.

For example, as a political science major, I had tons of separate Google Doc notes from all the different lectures. I would have been able to copy and paste that text into any AI chatbot and ask it to generate concise summaries with higher-level points of view. 

Also: 35% of college students are using AI tools to help them with their studies

For the sake of this article, I copied and pasted my  latest ZDNET article into Copilot and asked it to write a summary, as seen below. Within seconds, it organized my article into six main points that were accurate, easy to read, and, most importantly, easy to parse through. 

If your professor shares notes, outlines, or other course materials, you can ask an AI chatbot to summarize those too. 

5. Roleplay testing you 

In grade school, my favorite studying technique was having my mom randomly test me on the material I was learning. Now, instead of relying on family or friends being awake during your midnight study sessions, you can use an AI chatbot to do the same thing for you. 

For example, you can ask the chatbot, "Can you test me on my exam material?" Then, the chatbot will ask you what the material is and generate questions based on the topic you share within seconds, as seen in the photo below. 

Once you answer, it can correct you, provide insight into what you said wrong, and even give you resources online to visit to familiarize yourself with the material better. 

If you want to take this feature up an extra notch, you can use a chatbot with PDF reading capabilities, as discussed in the first tip of this article, or paste your notes in, and ask it to generate questions specific to your PDF or notes for you to answer. 

You can also ask the chatbot to generate flashcards based on the material. The chatbot will tell you exactly what to add to the front and the back of the cards, so you can spend less time figuring out what to put on the cards and more time actually using them. 

Good luck with your finals! 

Artificial Intelligence

The best free ai courses (and whether ai 'micro-degrees' and certificates are worth it), google releases two new free resources to help you optimize your ai prompts, what is ai everything to know about artificial intelligence.

The Trumpification of the Supreme Court

The conservative justices have shown they are ready to sacrifice any law or principle to save the former president.

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The notion that Donald Trump’s supporters believe that he should be able to overthrow the government and get away with it sounds like hyperbole, an absurd and uncharitable caricature of conservative thought. Except that is exactly what Trump’s attorney D. John Sauer argued before the Supreme Court yesterday, taking the position that former presidents have “absolute immunity” for so-called official acts they take in office.

“How about if a president orders the military to stage a coup?” Justice Elena Kagan asked Sauer. “I think it would depend on the circumstances whether it was an official act,” Sauer said after a brief exchange. “If it were an official act … he would have to be impeached and convicted.”

“That sure sounds bad, doesn’t it?” Kagan replied later.

The Democratic appointees on the bench sought to illustrate the inherent absurdity of this argument with other scenarios as well—Kagan got Sauer to admit that the president could share nuclear secrets, while Justice Sonia Sotomayor presented a scenario in which a president orders the military to assassinate a political rival. Sauer said that might qualify as an official act too. It was the only way to maintain the logic of his argument, which is that Trump is above the law.

David A. Graham: The cases against Trump: A guide

“Trying to overthrow the Constitution and subvert the peaceful transfer of power is not an official act, even if you conspire with other government employees to do it and you make phone calls from the Oval Office,” Michael Waldman, a legal expert at the Brennan Center for Justice, a liberal public-policy organization, told me.

Trump’s legal argument is a path to dictatorship. That is not an exaggeration: His legal theory is that presidents are entitled to absolute immunity for official acts. Under this theory, a sitting president could violate the law with impunity, whether that is serving unlimited terms or assassinating any potential political opponents, unless the Senate impeaches and convicts the president. Yet a legislature would be strongly disinclined to impeach, much less convict, a president who could murder all of them with total immunity because he did so as an official act. The same scenario applies to the Supreme Court, which would probably not rule against a chief executive who could assassinate them and get away with it.

The conservative justices have, over the years, seen harbingers of tyranny in union organizing , environmental regulations , civil-rights laws , and universal-health-care plans . When confronted with a legal theory that establishes actual tyranny, they were simply intrigued. As long as Donald Trump is the standard-bearer for the Republicans, every institution they control will contort itself in his image in an effort to protect him.

The Supreme Court, however, does not need to accept Trump’s absurdly broad claim of immunity for him to prevail in his broader legal battle. Such a ruling might damage the image of the Court, which has already been battered by a parade of hard-right ideological rulings. But if Trump can prevail in November, delay is as good as immunity. The former president’s best chance at defeating the federal criminal charges against him is to win the election and then order the Justice Department to dump the cases. The Court could superficially rule against Trump’s immunity claim, but stall things enough to give him that more fundamental victory.

If they wanted, the justices could rule expeditiously as well as narrowly , focusing on the central claim in the case and rejecting the argument that former presidents have absolute immunity for acts committed as president, without getting into which acts might qualify as official or not. Sauer also acknowledged under questioning by Justice Amy Coney Barrett that some of the allegations against Trump do not involve official acts but private ones, and so theoretically the prosecution could move ahead with those charges and not others. But that wouldn’t necessarily delay the trial sufficiently for Trump’s purposes.

“On big cases, it’s entirely appropriate for the Supreme Court to really limit what they are doing to the facts of the case in front of it, rather than needing to take the time to write an epic poem on the limits of presidential immunity,” Waldman said. “If they write a grant opinion, saying no president is above the law, but it comes out too late in the year, they will have effectively immunized Trump from prosecution before the election while pretending not to.”

Trump’s own attorneys argued in 2021, during his second impeachment trial, that the fact that he could be criminally prosecuted later was a reason not to impeach him. As The New York Times reported , Trump’s attorney Bruce Castor told Congress that “after he is out of office,” then “you go and arrest him.” Trump was acquitted in the Senate for his attempted coup after only a few Republicans voted for conviction; some of those who voted to acquit did so reasoning that Trump was subject to criminal prosecution as a private citizen. The catch-22 here reveals that the actual position being taken is that the president is a king, or that he is entitled to make himself one. At least if his name is Donald Trump.

David A. Graham: The Supreme Courts goes through the looking glass of presidential immunity

Democracy relies on the rule of law and the consent of the governed—neither of which is possible in a system where the president can commit crimes or order them committed if he feels like it. “We can’t possibly have an executive branch that is cloaked in immunity and still expect them to act in the best interests of the people in a functioning democracy,” Praveen Fernandes, the vice president of the Constitutional Accountability Center, a liberal legal organization, told me.

The only part of Trump’s case that contains anything resembling a reasonable argument is the idea that without some kind of immunity for official acts, presidents could be prosecuted on a flimsy basis by political rivals. But this argument is stretched beyond credibility when it comes to what Trump did, which was to try repeatedly and in multiple ways to unlawfully seize power after losing an election. Even if the prospect of presidents being prosecuted for official acts could undermine the peaceful transfer of power, actually trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power is a much more direct threat—especially because it has already happened. But the Republican-appointed justices seemed much more concerned about the hypothetical than the reality.

“If an incumbent who loses a very close, hotly contested election knows that a real possibility after leaving office is not that the president is going to be able to go off into a peaceful retirement but that the president may be criminally prosecuted by a bitter political opponent,” Justice Samuel Alito asked, “will that not lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country as a democracy?”

Trump has the conservative justices arguing that you cannot prosecute a former president for trying to overthrow the country, because then they might try to overthrow the country, something Trump already attempted and is demanding immunity for doing. The incentive for an incumbent to execute a coup is simply much greater if the Supreme Court decides that the incumbent cannot be held accountable if he fails. And not just a coup, but any kind of brazen criminal behavior. “The Framers did not put an immunity clause into the Constitution. They knew how to,” Kagan pointed out during oral arguments. “And, you know, not so surprising, they were reacting against a monarch who claimed to be above the law. Wasn’t the whole point that the president was not a monarch and the president was not supposed to be above the law?”

At least a few of the right-wing justices seemed inclined to if not accept Trump’s immunity claim, then delay the trial, which would likely improve his reelection prospects. As with the Colorado ballot-access case earlier this year, in which the justices prevented Trump from being thrown off the ballot in accordance with the Constitution’s ban on insurrectionists holding office , the justices’ positions rest on a denial of the singularity of Trump’s actions.

No previous president has sought to overthrow the Constitution by staying in power after losing an election. Trump is the only one, which is why these questions are being raised now. Pretending that these matters concern the powers of the presidency more broadly is merely the path the justices sympathetic to Trump have chosen to take in order to rationalize protecting the man they would prefer to be the next president. What the justices—and other Republican loyalists—are loath to acknowledge is that Trump is not being uniquely persecuted; he is uniquely criminal.

This case—even more than the Colorado ballot-eligibility case—unites the right-wing justices’ political and ideological interests with Trump’s own. One way or another, they will have to choose between Trumpism and democracy. They’ve given the public little reason to believe that they will choose any differently than the majority of their colleagues in the Republican Party.

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The Last Thing This Supreme Court Could Do to Shock Us

There will be no more self-soothing after this..

For three long years, Supreme Court watchers mollified themselves (and others) with vague promises that when the rubber hit the road, even the ultraconservative Federalist Society justices of the Roberts court would put democracy before party whenever they were finally confronted with the legal effort to hold Donald Trump accountable for Jan. 6. There were promising signs: They had, after all, refused to wade into the Trumpian efforts to set aside the election results in 2020. They had, after all, hewed to a kind of sanity in batting away Trumpist claims about presidential records (with the lone exception of Clarence Thomas, too long marinated in the Ginni-scented Kool-Aid to be capable of surprising us, but he was just one vote). We promised ourselves that there would be cool heads and grand bargains and that even though the court might sometimes help Trump in small ways, it would privilege the country in the end. We kept thinking that at least for Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch and Chief Justice John Roberts , the voice of reasoned never-Trumpers might still penetrate the Fox News fog. We told ourselves that at least six justices, and maybe even seven, of the most MAGA-friendly court in history would still want to ensure that this November’s elections would not be the last in history. Political hacks they may be, but they were not lawless ones.

On Thursday, during oral arguments in Trump v. United States , the Republican-appointed justices shattered those illusions. This was the case we had been waiting for, and all was made clear—brutally so. These justices donned the attitude of cynical partisans, repeatedly lending legitimacy to the former president’s outrageous claims of immunity from criminal prosecution. To at least five of the conservatives, the real threat to democracy wasn’t Trump’s attempt to overturn the election—but the Justice Department’s efforts to prosecute him for the act. These justices fear that it is Trump’s prosecution for election subversion that will “destabilize” democracy, requiring them to read a brand-new principle of presidential immunity into a Constitution that guarantees nothing of the sort. They evinced virtually no concern for our ability to continue holding free and fair elections that culminate in a peaceful transfer of power. They instead offered endless solicitude for the former president who fought that transfer of power.

However the court disposes of Trump v. U.S. , the result will almost certainly be precisely what the former president craves: more delays, more hearings, more appeals—more of everything but justice . This was not a legitimate claim from the start, but a wild attempt by Trump’s attorneys to use his former role as chief executive of the United States to shield himself from the consequences of trying to turn the presidency into a dictatorship. After so much speculation that these reasonable, rational jurists would surely dispose of this ridiculous case quickly and easily, Thursday delivered a morass of bad-faith hand-wringing on the right about the apparently unbearable possibility that a president might no longer be allowed to wield his powers of office in pursuit of illegal ends. Just as bad, we heard a constant minimization of Jan. 6, for the second week in a row , as if the insurrection were ancient history, and history that has since been dramatically overblown, presumably for Democrats’ partisan aims.

We got an early taste of this minimization in Trump v. Anderson , the Colorado case about removing Trump from the ballot. The court didn’t have the stomach to discuss the violence at the Capitol in its sharply divided decision, which found for Trump ; indeed, the majority barely mentioned the events of Jan. 6 at all when rejecting Colorado’s effort to bar from the ballot an insurrectionist who tried to steal our democracy. But we let that one be, because we figured special counsel Jack Smith would ride to the rescue. Smith has indicted Trump on election subversion charges related to Jan. 6, and the biggest obstacle standing between the special counsel and a trial has been the former president’s outlandish claim that he has absolute immunity from criminal charges as a result of his having been president at the time. Specifically, Trump alleges that his crusade to overturn the election constituted “official acts” that are immune from criminal liability under a heretofore unknown constitutional principle that the chief executive is quite literally above the law.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held in February that the president does not have blanket or absolute immunity for all actions taken in office, including “official” acts performed under the guise of executing the law (for example, Trump’s attempt to weaponize the DOJ against election results under the pretense of investigating fraud). The D.C. Circuit’s emphatic, cross-ideological decision should have been summarily affirmed by SCOTUS within days. Instead, the justices set it for arguments two months down the road—a bad omen, to put it mildly . Even then, many court watchers held out hope that Thursday morning’s oral arguments were to be the moment for the nine justices of the Supreme Court to finally indicate their readiness to take on Trump, Trumpism, illiberalism, and slouching fascism.

It was not to be. Justice Samuel Alito best captured the spirit of arguments when he asked gravely “what is required for the functioning of a stable democratic society” (good start!), then answered his own question: total immunity for criminal presidents (oh, dear). Indeed, anything but immunity would, he suggested, encourage presidents to commit more crimes to stay in office: “Now, if an incumbent who loses a very close, hotly contested election knows that a real possibility after leaving office is not that the president is going to be able to go off into a peaceful retirement but that the president may be criminally prosecuted by a bitter political opponent, will that not lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country as a democracy?” Never mind that the president in question did not leave office peacefully and is not sitting quietly in retirement but is instead running for presidential office once again. No, if we want criminal presidents to leave office when they lose, we have to let them commit crimes scot-free. If ever a better articulation of the legal principle “Don’t make me hit you again” has been proffered at an oral argument, it’s hard to imagine it.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor spoke to this absurdity when she responded in what could only be heard as a cri de coeur: “Stable democratic society needs good faith of public officials,” she said. “That good faith assumes that they will follow the law.” The justice noted that despite all the protections in place, a democracy can sometimes “potentially fail.” She concluded: “In the end, if it fails completely, it’s because we destroyed our democracy on our own, isn’t it?”

But it was probably too late to make this plea, because by that point we had heard both Alito and Gorsuch opine that presidents must be protected at all costs from the whims of overzealous deep state prosecutors brandishing “vague” criminal statutes. We heard Kavanaugh opine mindlessly on the independent counsel statute and how mean it is to presidents, reading extensively from Justice Antonin Scalia’s dissent in a case arguing that independent counsels are unconstitutional. (Yes, Kavanaugh worked for Ken Starr , the independent counsel.) If you’re clocking a trend here, it’s gender. Just as was the case in Anderson , it’s the women justices doing the second-shift work here: both probing the thorny constitutional and criminal questions and signaling a refusal to tank democracy over abstractions and deflections. As was the case in the EMTALA arguments, it’s the women who understand what it looks like to cheat death.

Is the president, Sotomayor asked, immune from prosecution if he orders the military to assassinate a political rival? Yes, said John Sauer, who represented Trump—though it “depends on the circumstances.” Could the president, Justice Elena Kagan asked, order the military to stage a coup? Yes, Sauer said again, depending on the circumstances. To which Kagan tartly replied that Sauer’s insistence on specifying the “circumstances” boiled down to “Under my test, it’s an official act, but that sure sounds bad, doesn’t it?” (Cue polite laughter in the chamber.)

This shameless, maximalist approach should have drawn anger from the conservative justices—indignation, at least, that Sauer took them for such easy marks. But it turns out that he calibrated his terrible arguments just right. The cynicism on display was truly breathtaking: Alito winkingly implied to Michael Dreeben, representing Smith, that we all know that Justice Department lawyers are political hacks, right? Roberts mocked Dreeben for saying “There’s no reason to worry because the prosecutor will act in good faith.”

The conservative justices are so in love with their own voices and so convinced of their own rectitude that they monologued about how improper it was for Dreeben to keep talking about the facts of this case, as opposed to the “abstract” principles at play. “I’m talking about the future!” Kavanaugh declared at one point to Dreeben, pitching himself not as Trump’s human shield but as a principled defender of the treasured constitutional right of all presidents to do crime. (We’re sure whatever rule he cooks up will apply equally to Democratic presidents, right?) Kavanaugh eventually landed on the proposition that prosecutors may charge presidents only under criminal statutes that explicitly state they can be applied to the president. Which, as Sotomayor pointed out, would mean no charges everywhere, because just a tiny handful of statutes are stamped with the label “CAN BE APPLIED TO PRESIDENT.”

The words bold and fearless action were repeated on a loop today, as a kind of mantra of how effective presidents must be free to act quickly and decisively to save democracy from the many unanticipated threats it faces. And yet the court—which has been asked to take bold and fearless action to deter the person who called Georgia’s secretary of state to demand that he alter the vote count, and threatened to fire DOJ officials who would not help steal an election—is backing away from its own duty. The prospect of a criminal trial for a criminal president shocked and appalled five men: Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, and Gorsuch suggested that Smith’s entire prosecution is unconstitutional; meanwhile, Roberts sounded eager at times to handle the case just a hair more gracefully: by cutting out its heart by preventing the jury from hearing about “official acts” (which lie at the center of the alleged conspiracy). Justice Amy Coney Barrett was far more measured, teasing out a compromise with Dreeben that would compel the trial court to tell the jury it could not impose criminal liability for these “official” acts, only “private ones.” Remember, drawing that line would require months of hearings and appeals, pushing any trial into 2025 or beyond. The president who tried to steal the most recent election is running in the next one, which is happening in mere months.

The liberal justices tried their best to make the case that justice required denying Trump’s sweeping immunity claim, permitting the trial to move forward, and sorting out lingering constitutional issues afterward, as virtually all other criminal defendants must do. They got little traction. Everyone on that bench was well aware that the entire nation was listening to arguments; that the whole nation wants to understand whether Trump’s refusal to concede the 2020 election was an existential threat to democracy or a lark. Five justices sent the message, loud and clear, that they are far more worried about Trump’s prosecution at the hands of the deep-state DOJ than about his alleged crimes, which were barely mentioned. This trial will almost certainly face yet more delays. These delays might mean that its subject could win back the presidency in the meantime and render the trial moot. But the court has now signaled that nothing he did was all that serious and that the danger he may pose is not worth reining in. The real threats they see are the ones Trump himself shouts from the rooftops: witch hunts and partisan Biden prosecutors. These men have picked their team. The rest hardly matters.

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Advice to Protesters, and History’s Echoes

More from our inbox:, trump logic, another civil war in the u.s., the four lessons.

To the Editor:

Re “ Universities Choose Different Ways to End Unrest ” (news article, May 2):

The rigid dialogue on American college campuses about the Israel-Hamas war has been fruitless.

One side argues that Palestine should be freed from Israel’s tyranny, when clearly the real tyranny is from Palestinian terrorist leaders whose pointless insistence on the destruction of Israel is why Palestinians don’t live in peace.

The other side absolves Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government of any wrongdoing. This is absurd, as Mr. Netanyahu failed to protect his people, and in doing so was compelled to wage a war that has killed countless innocent Gazans.

My encouragement to the college protesters on both sides is to stop doing easy things like setting up encampments and chanting slogans at each other. Instead, join together to do the hard work of trying to find a sustainable solution to peace in the Middle East.

Leave blind partisanship to politicians, and use your intelligence, energy and creativity to be the generation that solves the problem.

Richard Stever-Zeitlin Hyattsville, Md.

Relationships break down when people stop talking. Brown University seems to have found a solution to campus unrest by continuing talks with protesters. This is good news! I recommend that university leaders meet with students, close the doors to the room and come out when you’ve reached an agreement. Keep talking!

Ronald Yarger Morris Plains, N.J.

Re “ How Protesters Can Actually Help Palestinians ,” by Nicholas Kristof (column, May 2):

Recently I began to total up in my mind what the students have spent to be comfortable, appropriately dressed, fed and able to produce new protest signs every day. ​They have spent millions of dollars on themselves while demanding that colleges and universities rethink their investment strategies. Those are millions of dollars that could have fed, housed, clothed and healed millions of people in Gaza.

I hope students read Mr. Kristof, and begin to understand that they have the power, and perhaps the obligation, to help ease the lives of those caught up in a tragedy. Their protest will be successful if it moves everyone to take a moment to rethink their “investment strategies.”

Elaine Hess Bethlehem, Pa.

Spot on, Nicholas Kristof. It’s unbearable to watch the wrong-turn activism turn people away from the rightness of this justified protest. So much more could be accomplished — helping “real people in desperate need,” as Mr. Kristof puts it — by raising funds or putting educated boots on the ground.

Maggie Hill Queens

Re “ On Campus at Columbia, in 1968 and Now ,” by Serge Schmemann (Opinion, April 30):

I second Mr. Schmemann’s view of the benefits of college demonstrations. Sixty years ago this December, I was part of an 800-student sit-in at Sproul Hall on the University of California’s Berkeley campus.

The Free Speech Movement, as it became known, was protesting a policy that prohibited students from placing card tables on campus to solicit money and volunteers to work for voting rights and against racial bias in hiring at restaurants in Jack London Square in Oakland. Yet card tables to sell tickets for school events had been regularly allowed.

Officials called the police, and we were arrested in the middle of the night. We were tried en masse, convicted of trespass and fined.

I learned two lessons. First, calling the cops on students is almost always a bad idea regardless of the disruption. We would have been gone after a day or two of sleeping on Sproul Hall’s dirty floor and using its backed-up toilets.

Second, watching the trial led me to switch from grad school to law school, where I learned that the university’s policy discriminated based on viewpoint and content, in violation of the First Amendment. We might have achieved the same goal with a federal court injunction, but then we would have missed out on all the student camaraderie.

Stephen Gillers New York The writer is emeritus professor at N.Y.U. School of Law.

Re “ Trump, Seeking Presidential Immunity, Wants to Prosecute Biden ” (news analysis, May 1):

While it’s logically inconsistent for Donald Trump, out of one side of his mouth, to demand presidential immunity for himself while out of the other side of that same discordant mouth threaten to have Joe Biden indicted, Mr. Trump is speaking not as a logician (LOL) or a lawmaker, but as a politician rallying his base by simultaneously stoking his own anger and that of his followers.

Mr. Trump has never shown the slightest ability or need to traffic in logic or consistency, knowing that the right-wing media will have his back, regardless of his unending emittance of fallacious foibles, and knowing, too, that his essential appeal to his base is built upon anger and rage, not logic and consistency, nor even a passing resemblance to facts or truth.

Richard J. Brenner Miller Place, N.Y.

Re “ How the Movie ‘Civil War’ Echoes Real Political Anxieties in America ” (news article, April 24):

I do believe, sadly, that political violence or even a civil war could erupt, depending on the whims of Donald Trump. Mr. Trump is running a campaign based on revenge and retribution. Look at how he tries to intimidate witnesses and court personnel regarding his various legal matters.

He has said that if he wins the presidency again he will install only people completely loyal to him to run government offices, and he will use these offices to go after people he does not like.

The threat of violence is a useful tool for Mr. Trump in his quest to become president again and continue to try to destroy our democracy, our governing systems and the rule of law.

Do not ever underestimate him; take him at his word. If he orders his supporters to take to the streets, there is a strong possibility that enough will comply so that damage and harm will ensue, possibly marking the beginning of a civil war.

We are in this dangerous moment courtesy of Mr. Trump. And he cares nothing about the consequences.

Howard Herman Skokie, Ill.

Re “ The Most Important Lessons Aren’t on the Syllabus ,” by Frank Bruni (Opinion guest essay, April 21):

I could not agree more with Mr. Bruni’s piece. I tell my students at the New School that they may forget the content of the course, but I hope they remember three things they will learn in class: how to think, how to write and how to present an idea with enough humility that others will listen.

I now have to add a fourth: the courage to stand up for what you think is right respectfully. If they accomplish this, they can consider themselves educated.

Alan McGowan New York