Good Morning! I think we don’t realize, as adults, the impact that politics has on kids. Particularly when things are as crazy as they are right now and kids are more plugged in than ever before. My 11 year old son, Grady, who has been following the news with his friends and has seen me writing this Substack, is worried that no one cares about or is paying attention to the thoughts of his generation, who will have to deal with the fallout for all of this their entire lives. So he has decided to start his own Substack: The Political View from Middle School. The first issue, which is below, can also be found on his page here: I hope you’ll enjoy it and encourage his work by subscribing to his page and letting him know what you think in the comments! Lucas Hi, and welcome to my Substack, The Political View from Middle School. My name is Grady Kunce and I'm in the sixth grade. On my Substack, I will talk about politics, but in a different way than you may see them. I’ll be talking about them through the eyes of me and my friends, the eyes of middle schoolers. I am doing this because I want people to know that kids are a part of this world, too, and because I think if a lot of people subscribe it will show us that people really do care about us. (You can Subscribe to The Political View from Middle School by clicking here) I will talk about what it is like for us when political events occur, what I think about them, and how I think they affect kids like me. I will also share other points of view from my fellow classmates and friends. I am not going to use AI or ChatGPT or anything like that to help because I want you to hear it from me. So the talk going around school last week was how Trump signed an order to dismantle the department of education. A few days ago I got really worried when I heard about this. I was just sitting at the table getting ready for school like any other start of the day when my friends started texting about what Trump did the day before, but I didn’t understand. I hadn't heard of anything that had happened the night before. When I asked them what had happened, my friend sent me the title of an article that said “Trump signs an order to dismantle the department of education.” And that’s when I started to freak out. I asked my mom what this meant, and she told me not to worry too much about it. But I was still worried, so after school, I did some research, talked to my friends, and found some answers. Now, I’m gonna be honest, most of the articles that popped up were a little boring to a kid like me, but I was determined to learn more about the department of education and how dismantling it was going to affect me. I was worried that my school was going to lose a lot of funding and therefore after school programs and materials, and after some research I finally got a clear answer of what the department did and that I think I was right. The department of education oversees the funding of public schools, which means that to keep up, my school might have to get rid of after school programs and even fire a few teachers. But I also learned that I was not going to be affected as much as some others. The department of education also oversees student loans and other programs that help low-income students, which means thousands of these kids might be forced to drop out of school. But I’m really annoyed about why the president is cutting this department. And he is doing it to pay for rich people’s taxes. I think that this is an absurd reason to do such a thing, and many people at my school agree with me. Why are rich people so worried about getting more money and don’t care about kids? Why don’t we mean anything to them? Thousands of low-income and disabled students are going to be affected by this order and many other civil rights laws for public schools will be dumped as well, just to pay for a few rich people’s taxes. Other kids will also be affected because the lack of funds will cause schools to only be able to afford some materials and teachers. This means that classes will also be larger due to lack of teachers. I’m worried they won’t be able to help all of us anymore. I also believe that getting rid of this department would be giving up on our future because of the many kids that will have to stop learning or will not learn enough. So I hope, along with many of my peers, that the order fails and the department of education stays as it is, even though it does not look very good for this hope. But I also want to do more than just hope, which is why I am starting this Substack. I want my voice to be heard and people to understand what it is like to be a kid while these events occur. I also want people to look at these things from a kid’s point of view, which may help you understand what your child is going through and maybe just make you look at it differently. Thank you for reading this substack, which will be the first of many. I plan to post a new substack on politics and what is going on at schools every weekend or every other weekend. Please ask me in the comments if there is anything you would like to know our thoughts on. It is free to subscribe to my substack, because, like I mentioned at the beginning, I want people to know that kids are a part of this world, too, and because I think if a lot of people subscribe it will show us that people really do care about us. But if you would like to support my work financially, I am offering the minimum subscription amounts that substack will let me do. $5.00 a month to subscribe or $50.00 a year (discount for yearly). I tried to do $2 a month and $18 a year, but it wouldn’t let me. So if the minimum is too much, don’t feel bad about being a free subscriber. I think sharing is the most important thing. I will send out messages asking paid subscribers to submit questions that I will try to answer. My dad just did an ask me anything and I think that might be a good idea, too. But in the meantime, thank you for reading this substack, please share it with your friends and family, and again I plan to publish a new one every weekend or every other weekend. Thank you! Grady PS— I wrote this by myself but my dad did help me set up the account, checked for typos, and helped me add links.
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Saturday, April 5, 2025
Why are they attacking us kids?
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