Last night, eight Georgia Southern University students formed a panel called “Occupy Wall Street: What, Why How?” to explain what the mission of Occupy Wall Street is.

Students approached the political science department about organizing the event, said Dr. Debra Sabia, an associate professor of political science.

“This is a student led conversation to help students understand what the movement is about, who’s involved and where it’s going,” said Sabia.

Panel members shared information they had gathered about the OWS movement and answered questions from the audience.

Viewing the occupy movement in a political way makes the group's message clear, said senior sociology major Charles Feagain.

“From a street level, occupy has many messages, and it can be confusing, but from a political perspective, it’s fairly simple,” said Feagain. “The people that gamble with our money, our pension, our insurance pay less in taxes than we do.”

“A lot of people our age get turned off by the political process. We’re afraid of it, if not apathetic to it, but the problems our generation faces are enormous,” said Feagain.

“The Tea Party was angry about the same things that Occupy Wall Street is. The difference is that they went through the political system and tried to change it from the inside,” said Chad Hamilton, sophomore political science major.

The OWS movement’s originally aimed to voice their feelings about the influence Wall Street has on the U.S. government, said freshman political science major David Griffin.

“The original goal (of OWS) was to convince Obama to make a commission to limit the influence of money in the political system,” said Griffin. “They believe that Wall Street has too much control over the political process.”

For the full article, read the upcoming Nov. 6 edition of The George-Anne.