Danya Rafiqi is press assistant for Beto O’Rourke’s presidential campaign in Iowa. You can follow her on Twitter @DanyaRafiqi. -promoted by Laura Belin

I grew up in a politically apathetic household. My parents voted occasionally, and we might have even put the local nightly news on a couple times a week, but the power of “getting involved” was not something I learned about growing up.

But as a daughter of Pakistani Muslim immigrants, I learned about what to do when someone yelled at me in a grocery aisle, or how to respond to someone when they questioned my American-ness.

And though I remember the moment I realized that I did not have the privilege to ignore politics completely, I can’t remember anyone ever knocking on our door or calling to ask if my parents were going to vote.

The College and Young Democrats of Iowa have urged all the presidential campaigns to pay their interns. Lucy Karlin writes about her experience working for Cory Booker this summer. -promoted by Laura Belin

I have been an unpaid intern on Democratic campaigns for the last three years, and the experiences have inspired me to pursue political science as a major in college. As I am now in college, I knew I had to make money this summer to help pay for tuition, but I was torn because I didn’t know if that would enable me to still be engaged in campaigns.