While Cascadia Community College students are hitting the books in their classrooms, a group of Kenmore and Bothell people are hitting the sidewalks, putting up their campaign signs and talking to voters about the upcoming general election.

On a recent Thursday evening, 10 of Erin Richards’ students in her Cascadia state and local politics course ventured into downtown Bothell and listened intently to the candidates’ messages at a forum in the City Council chambers.

“State and local government is what has a much more direct and immediate impact on our everyday life,” said Richards, who lived in Kenmore for two years before moving to Bremerton. “I wanted to encourage (my students) this year to take advantage of an opportunity that’s just down the road, since so many of them do live here in the Bothell area.”

Richards added that even those students who don’t live in Bothell can still get caught up in local politics because city officials could be making rules and regulations that affect Bothell’s Cascadia campus, which it shares with the University of Washington, Bothell.

Both students — who received extra credit — and instructor — who added to her arsenal of classroom topics — had an eye-opening experience at the forum.

“It was enlightening to me to hear about some of the issues. I’ve always wondered what was going on down with the Bothell Landing, and the fact that that seems to have been stalled for so long in terms of the construction,” said Richards, adding that she learned of some environmental issues (protection of forests and streams), as well, and hopes the new McMenamins can serve as a meeting place for Cascadia faculty members.

Bothell High alum Jergen Nyhammer, 21, plans to vote for the first time in the general election after attending the forum and delving into the world of politics in Richards’ class.

“I found it very interesting because I have grown up in Bothell all my life,” Nyhammer said of the forum. “It brought up a lot of issues I wasn’t aware of — (restoring native plants and improving aquatic habitat at) Horse Creek, a new city hall and Google moving into North Creek.”

Nyhammer added that he enjoyed watching the candidates go from serious to cracking a joke or two in order to give people a brief break from tackling the weighty issues.

For Bothell resident Maya Olsen, 18, she took advanced-placement government and politics classes at Inglemoor High last year, and now she’s hooked on Richards’ class. She planned on registering to vote last week, so Olsen may soon be filling out a general-election ballot.

After watching the Bothell candidates express themselves at the forum, Olsen may also organize a young-government group.

“I found myself, since I live in Bothell, feeling the issues that are happening, like revitalizing downtown Bothell, restoring it but keeping it’s own little charm,” said Olsen, who also listed downtown building height restrictions and getting Bothell Landing rolling (“it’s just sitting there, growing weeds”) as two other top issues.

One issue that “hit me down deep” was securing additional funding for the Northshore Senior Center, where her mother works. She’s all for it, continuing to give the elderly population a top-notch place to gather.

Richards is impressed that her students have shown an interest in local government, both inside and outside of the classroom. She noted that Cascadia President Eric Murray informed her of the forum and she and her students ran with it.

“I’m really passionate about young people being involved in politics. As we know, the 18-to-25-year-old age group has the lowest participation rate out of any age demographic, and yet, they’re probably some of the people most directly affected by what goes on,” said Richards, who was involved with a political-party organization in college and campaigned for her mother — who ran for a political office — as a youngster.

And Richards is just as interested as ever, especially when singling out the Mayor Mark Lamb versus councilmember Tris Samberg race for Position No. 6 on this year’s ballot. She feels for two incumbents to be running against each other is “kind of unusual, so I think that will be some really great things for my students and I to talk about.”

As a women-in-politics scholar in college, Richards also focused her attention on Samberg being the only female on the six-person panel at the forum. She noted that Samberg and Lamb are both seasoned politicians, but because of gender stereotypes, Samberg has to walk a fine line of being a confident leader and not coming on too strong.

“I think that she walked that line very well, by saying, ‘This is what I believe, this is why I believe it,’” Richards said, “but doing it in a way that is very leader-like without crossing that line, which is a really tough line to walk for a lot of women.”

When students Nyhammer and Olsen eyed the candidates at the forum, they saw normal people putting themselves out there to try and make a difference in their community. And they both feel they can do that job someday after getting a taste of Bothell politics.

“Local government has never clicked with me as something that is very important, but I kind of realize now, you can actually have a lot of a say into that,” said Nyhammer, who noted that repairing roads and holding off on a new city hall would be his suggestion to councilmembers. “The whole time I was in there, I was (thinking) I could totally see myself doing this someday, trying to represent the city I’ve grown up in and loved all my life.”

Olsen hopes to cast her vote come Nov. 8, and then somewhere down the line, perhaps she’ll step onto a city council, she said with a smile.

“If I want things to be happening, you kind of have to have a voice out there — and I don’t mind being that voice.”

• The Bothell candidate forum is airing at 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. every day on BCTV Channel 21/26 and is available on the city’s homepage, www.ci.bothell.wa.us.