Charles Vojta ’15, proud member of the senior class, stalwart in the boys’ hockey program, experimenter of lacrosse and dabbler in soccer, has a passion: politics.
Vojta’s interest in the political world is broad. His involvement in state, national and global political matters illustrates his intellectual versatility and deep interest in the world of politics. His résumé, in terms of involvement in politics, is quite impressive. As a campaign organizer for the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (DFL), Vojta works in a plethora of roles to support the party. As a Senate Page in Washington D.C., Vojta scurried around the capital and assisted the daily operations of the Senate. And, as one of the captains of the school’s Model United Nations club, Vojta can be seen intensely debating on and sweating over international issues.
This past summer, Vojta played an active role as a campaign coordinator for the Minnesota DFL party. “I worked across all the DFL campaigns, like the Minnesota House, Governor and Senate campaigns,” Vojta explained. He adds, “It was a really great way to learn the issues affecting not only specific races, but the state as a whole.” Vojta’s work encompassed door knocking, phoning voters, and volunteering at campaign events. All his efforts were made to “make sure [the party’s] cause moved forward.”
Out of the hundreds that applied, Vojta was selected as one of 30 US Senate Pages and participated in a semester-long stay in the nation’s capital last year. As a Senate Page, Vojta participated in essential legislative activities, which included delivering messages and legislative documents around the capital in 16-hour shifts. A benefit to his experience was that he got to interact with Senators and hear each speech that was made. He rubbed elbows with many national figures and some Senators occasionally bought him dinner. He also earned $13,000. Vojta offered a monologue on his experience as a Senate Page and with government in general, “Regardless of whether you like government or not, it’s important and it plays a big role in all of our lives. I went in a Republican and came out a Democrat, I went in not knowing the issues that well, I knew where my parents stood and knew where I thought I stood, and then as I looked into the issues more, I found out that I actually stand more towards the Democrats than the Republicans. Before you look at the issues deeply and specifically, you don’t really know where you stand. It’s really tough to know where you stand and to make sure you are an educated voter. That’s important to being a responsible citizen in the US.”
Vojta is a veteran of Blake’s Model UN club and has been an active member since freshman year. He has had experience in the conferences held by the University of Chicago and Georgetown University; he will also travel to Harvard with the club this February to participate in the conference held there. As a captain of the club, Vojta’s role is to mentor younger participants in the club, participate in the managing of the club with teacher leaders David Graham and Jon Dicus, and to perform well at the conferences the club travels to.
On participating in clubs and political activities in general, Vojta offered sage advice: “If politics or international relations is one of your interests, the best thing you can do is get out there and be involved. Find something you love and start doing it.”