Campaign-In-A-Day Student Profile: Damon Sidur

In 2016 American Majority held our first Campaign-In-A-Day event in July in Ohio with 70 students. Fast forward to 2019 where this summer we have traveled to 7 states to train over 400 students and adults through our traditional Campaign-In-A-Day, training as well as the new Campaign-In-A-Day Snapshot, and our Campaign-In-A-Week programs. This profile series of blog posts are this summer’s attendees experiences with the event.

Name: Damon Sidur
From: California
Education: Student at Colorado Christian University studying Political Science 
Campaign-In-A-Days Attended: YCCLC Campaign-In-A-Week 2019

I had an absolute blast in CIAW, and I think it is a great workshop for any college student whether you are into politics or not. My Campaign-In-A-Week experience consisted of using strengths of mine such as public speaking, making quick decisions, and my love for politics. During CIAW, I learned what it takes to run a campaign including: who to target for raising money/fundraising; who are the people you are trying to get to vote for you to receive a better turnout, and much more. 

CIAW is super helpful for all students, political and non-political, because you can learn so much about politics and running for government that you probably never knew, and it is great practice for public speaking. When it came to working as a team, we were very good at delegating jobs, so that everyone was doing something, and we got work done on time. On the day of the election, we helped our candidate and campaign manager practice their speeches. 

The most difficult part of CIAW was probably figuring out how to spend money appropriately, as well as dealing with the twists that we were given and had to deal with in ten minutes, but those were also some of the most fun. For any future CIAW students, I would say, have fun with it and don’t stress about making mistakes. I made plenty myself, but I learned great things from them! My campaign roles consisted of Press Secretary and Communications Director. For these, I got to answer questions from a news anchor from the other team and focus on the twists our team was given. As a political science major, this extremely interested me, and I ended up answering many of the questions our team was given. I made some mistakes, but like I said, I learned great things from them and had a great time doing it!