As part of her role as Park elections specialist, Cara Luebke said she is running a new civic engagement program to get students more involved in politics.

“Last year it was a program called student elections program,” Luebke said. “Now we’re kind of revamping it to be a little bit more focused on what civics means and what a city does and how we talk about it, how we get the work done, how we recognize external factors.”

Junior and past election judge Dahlia Krebs said Civics in the Park seems broader than past youth programs run throughout the city.

“Last year I did a similar program: the student election program, and this seems like it,” Krebs said. “But instead of being centering toward voting, it’s just centered around what you can do to be involved in politics (in our) city.”

According to Luebke, the program will be very flexible to the interests of the students who participate.

“Each meeting will be surrounding a different civic life topic,” Luebke said. “From there, the students who participate will have the opportunity to choose a topic or an issue or something that they care about to work on throughout our time together.” 

Krebs said students should get involved in local government because of the impact it has on the school and students as citizens of St. Louis Park.

“(Government) is what decides a lot about our school. A lot of things that we take for granted are signed by City Council,” Krebs said. “For a lot of us who can’t vote yet, this is one way to make sure our voices are heard.”

According to Krebs, Civics in the Park is a great program for students to experience to see if they enjoy civic engagement. 

“Just try it out,” Krebs said. “If you go to a couple of meetings, you really don’t find it interesting or helpful for you, then you can leave, but it’s a good way to try it out and try and get involved.”

Luebke said she encourages students to participate and give feedback on how the program can better fit their needs.

“If you’re not quite sure, just come anyway. One of the best skills you can learn as a young person is how to show up and what that means in different spaces,” Luebke said. “(It’s) different from most programming where it’s a set schedule. We’re going to have a little bit of that, but the rest of it is choose-your-own-adventure style.”

According to Luebke, the first meeting will be Jan. 29 in room C379 at the high school. The program will have five meetings in total due to time and the unique election cycle in 2020 with three elections in one year.