Vandenburg, who loves politics, created the podcast not just because it is a perfect platform to express his interests but because he wants to help bridge the gap between Pasadenans, particularly young people, and local leaders “to build a stronger, safer, and healthier community.”
“It’s mainly focused on people from Pasadena and most especially young people. I think a lot of my classmates were the ones who were most interested in my podcast when I launched,” Vanderburg said.
Recently he featured four candidates vying for Pasadena City Councilmember seats to help voters to get to know the candidates better and make informed voting decisions this June.
The candidates addressed education, social and environmental issues during the episode.
“I felt like a lot of people and teenagers, especially young people, hadn’t really engaged with politics a lot. A lot of people didn’t even realize that there were City Council elections going on.”
“I wanted to, first of all, with the city council elections, help people understand the different platforms and views of the candidates, but more so with the whole podcast to try to help engage young people in politics — people my age,” Vandenburg said. “Make them see that there really is like something behind the curtain. And you can really learn a lot just by paying a little bit of attention.”
Vandenburg believes his podcast is a great alternative for people to hear new perspectives from politicians, news media professionals and social advocates, because it runs only for 10 to 15 minutes.
“I think a big part has been to try to bring different perspectives onto the podcast. So people really start to understand, like how does politics work from the perspective of a campaign strategist? What do things look like from the perspective of an editor of the LA Times. The different perspectives that people can see and so they can understand.”
Guests previously invited to speak on Vandenburg’s podcast talked about various topics including public safety, homelessness and gun violence.
According to Vandenburg, most of the listeners of his podcast are young people.
“The podcast is perfect for not only engaging people to talk about these issues in their communities and to think about these issues but also to show that there can be connection between young people and the constituency like us. And of course the public officials who are trying to do something about these problems.”
The Prep Politics Podcast is online for interested listeners at www.youthpolitics.net.
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One thought on “Local High School Senior’s Podcast Aims to Increase Political Engagement By Young People”
Good article about Thomas Vanderburg and his Prep
Politics Podcast.