While most juniors’ focus lies in ACT prep and college applications, one junior in particular is reading Marxist theory, attending protests and preparing for the revolution. Meet Sol Davids, a singer, athlete and passionate communist. He is a member of the Revolutionary Communists of America (RCA), an organization dedicated to organizing local communists, spreading ideas and taking IRL action.

Davids’s interest in the ideology began with a simple sticker.

“I had always known I was left-leaning, but the winter of my freshman year, I was walking around Chicago and saw a sticker that said ‘Are you a communist? Then get organized,'” Davids said. “It had a QR code, so I scanned it.”

This was a sticker for the RCA, and similar ones can be found all across the country.

Junior Harold Weissmann is a personal friend of Davids and has been since the seventh grade.

“He doesn’t really express his ideas openly very often. He doesn’t try to advertise it but doesn’t try to hide it either,” Weissmann said.  “He has a Karl Marx sticker on his Chromebook and wears an RCA shirt at least every other week.”

The RCA actively holds meetings in Chicago on a semi-frequent basis.

“I was able to have a very good conversation with one of the members… by the end of the year, I was able to make it to one of their meetings and everything they were saying just made sense,” Davids said.

The RCA was launched in 1998 as a branch of the Revoluntionary Communists International (RCI). It currently has about 1,000 active members.

“I’ve been a member for, I guess, coming up on two years now, and I’ve been slowly increasing my theoretical level, reading a lot of books, studying theory, but also getting involved in protests,” Davids said.

The RCA is known for recruitment at protests, especially protests for No Kings.  They have seen a dramatic increase in membership over the last year.

“I think that our purpose at No Kings isn’t to say, ‘This is the protest that we’ll finally take down Trump,'” Davids said. “That’s not what it’s gonna do. Our purpose there is to find people who also think the things need to change, but don’t really know where to go.”

The general public has shown increasing interest in socialist and communist ideology recently with the election of Zohran Mamdani, an open democratic socialist, to the position of Mayor of New York City. Davids offered his thoughts about him as well as other democratic socialist figures.

“I mean, I think that it’s a step in the right direction for Zohran, but they’re not going to be able to accomplish much working within the Democratic Party, working within capitalism,” Davids said. “It’s like trying to save a house that’s on fire from the inside of the house.” 

Davids admits that his idea of a communist future is open-ended.

“I guess it’s hard to know exactly what government after a revolution would be like, but the hope would be international,” Davids said. “Not necessarily every nation becoming the same country at once, but definitely some more. Probably a unified North America, if not Americas, and then full expansion of democracy.”

Davids also offered advice for people who are interested in communism but don’t know where to start.

 “There’s never been a better time to be a communist,” Davids said. “Capitalism is definitely in decline. We see that every day. Just take a look, explore your options, come to a meeting, read [RCA] media and talk to people, ask questions.”

Along with being a communist, he is involved in the classroom, onstage in the choir and athletically in cross country.

“Sol is a very smart and thoughtful student with a sense of humor that reminds me of the Sahara Desert,” social studies teacher Matthew Wiemer said.

Davids has a very tight-knit and diverse friend circle, all of whom sing his praises.

“He’s a great guy. He’s always honest and direct with people and shows up whenever people need him,” Weissmann said.