By Lilly Salcedo,
Duncanville High School
State Affairs Forum is a group of scholars who present proposals to the committee room to fight for what they think is best to improve the nation, one proposal at a time. These delegate students see the ideas presented and collaborate on how the idea can be implemented efficiently or if it should be implemented at all.
Daniela Cardenas from Oak Cliff YMCA presented an idea discussing the second chances of prisoners who served their time. Once these people obtain their freedom, they face significant discrimination because of their background. This mainly affects their professional career like wage and simple lack of opportunity to be hired. Having these individuals back in the workforce would not only help stimulate the ever rocky economy but help these individuals have a second chance.
This proposal not only focuses on post prisoners but also expands on younger citizens struggling to find jobs due to lack of experience. This helps young citizens begin to have a chance and to call something their own. Having a job is a very important stepping stone in one’s life because being an employee is essentially taking care of yourself since one finally has the funds to do so.
The basis of this proposal is to not just focus on prisoners who have paid what they owe through time, but to focus on the demography of people that are unemployed like the impoverished as well. While this issue can be very delicate to handle, the basis of giving more jobs to the unemployed is maintained throughout the argument.
The State Affairs Forum helps young students like Daniela put concepts like these into question so our society can become more fair and perspective of everyone’s situation. This group produces delegates facing their fears of speaking out as practice for their adulthood responsibilities. This subsection of the Youth and Government helps these young delegates in the best sense so that they can prosper in their own paths when they become individual adults.
Oak Cliff YMCA delegate Daniela Cardenas introduced a State Affairs proposal to help people integrate into society after incarceration.