VERMILLION, S.D. – A free one-day conference at the University of South Dakota will delve into confidence in voting and political polarization and its impact on election workers. It will also include details on a plan to start teaching civics to all public university students in the state.
The Chiesman Center for Democracy Conference will be held 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Central time on Thursday, March 27, in USD's Al Neuharth Center.
"It’s a chance to bring academics, students, politicians and community members together to talk about democracy, which is so important," said Julia Hellwege, director of the Chiesman Center. "Democracy only happens when people are involved."
This is her first year organizing the conference, which is in its fourth year of trying to improve democratic governance and civic education in South Dakota.
"The reality is politics is happening to you regardless, so you should be involved," she said. "It’s really hard to be heard if you’re not speaking."
Stu Whitney
The keynote speaker will be Lisa Bryant, professor and chair of political science at California State University, Fresno and an Andrew Carnegie fellow. She'll discuss how political polarization is affecting the workload, safety and attitudes about the profession of state and local election officials, how it's impacting trust and confidence among voters and how election officials could help rebuild that trust.
The session topics, which run 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.:
- Report on the state of democracy in South Dakota
- Chiesman-supported faculty research
- Question hour with South Dakota legislators
- Lisa Bryant's presentation, "Skepticism, Trust and Confidence in Elections"
- Civics and democracy through different lenses, which includes presentations from a student, a member of a civic organization, a journalist and a member of the South Dakota Board of Regents, who will discuss a new civics proficiency graduation requirement
The conference is free, but registration is required.
More information on elections and democracy are available on the Dakota Dialogs podcast series produced by Chiesman and SDPB.
This story was produced by South Dakota News Watch, an independent, nonprofit organization. Read more stories and donate at sdnewswatch.org and sign up for an email to get stories when they're published. Contact: info@sdnewswatch.org.
