ETS Study Shows How Colleges Can Help Students Become Active Voters

This is a re-post of a blog story that originally appeared on the blog of the Fair Elections Legal Network (FELN). FELN’s nonpartisan Campus Vote Project (CVP) is a partner and friend of ADP. Take a look at this summary of the new ETS report Fault Lines in Our Democracy: Civic Knowledge, Voting Behavior, and Civic Engagement in the United States. Dan Vicuna, the author of this blog story and CVP’s Coordinator will be at the ADP National Meeting in San Antonio. If you’d like to meet with him to learn more about CVP and how to connect your campus work with CVP, you can email him at dvicuna@campusvoteproject.org. CVP will also have a table at the Campus and Friends Showcase on Saturday, June 9 from 11:30 am – 12:30 pm.

As you gear up to register students for the November 2012 elections, make sure to check out CVP’s Campus Vote Project toolkit and other resources!

– Jen Domagal-Goldman, ADP National Manager

ETS Study Shows How Colleges Can Help Students Become Active Voters

By: Dan Vicuna, Coordinator of FELN’s Campus Vote Project

An Educational Testing Service (ETS) study on education and civic engagement demonstrates the role that colleges and universities can play in helping students become active and informed voters. The study suggests that many students arrive at college with limited knowledge of civics. For example, ETS found that only about one-quarter of American students in 4^th, 8^th, and 12^th grade achieved a “proficient” designation in civics, a level demonstrating solid academic performance. The study’s authors argue that voter turnout is likely to suffer as a result of this academic shortfall.

The study also examined the importance of establishing voting as a habit. ETS found that a young adult who voted in the 2004 election was 30 percent more likely to vote in the 2006 election than a young adult who did not vote in 2004. The authors concluded that voting in 2004 “played the most powerful role in voting in 2006.”

ETS argues that colleges and universities “can play a more active role in encouraging voting and civic participation at all levels by their students.” By helping students overcome the barriers to registration and voting that disproportionately affect them, colleges can set their students on a lifelong path of active civic engagement.

Colleges can implement reforms detailed in the Campus Vote Project toolkit to ensure that students have access to registration and voting information. For example, schools can increase understanding of the issues at stake by organizing election awareness campaigns. Administrators can also support student-run voter registration blitzes and organize student poll worker programs to encourage active participation in the 2012 elections.

For more information on the ways that FELN’s Campus Vote Project can work with your school to increase student participation in this year’s elections, contact Dan Vicuna at (202) 331-0114 or info@campusvoteproject.org.

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Re-posted from FELN’s blog; see the original post here.

ADP’s Electoral Voices monograph available for free Download as PDF

In 2006, AASCU’s American Democracy Project published Electoral Voices – Engaging College Students in Elections, a best practices guide. Until recently, this monograph has been for sale in the AASCU online bookstore. Now, in time for planning for the 2012 national election, we’re re-releasing the guide as a free, downloadable PDF.

At the time of publication, George Mehaffy wrote in the Foreword, “As we approach yet another series of national and state elections, we hope this monograph will assist our colleagues in higher education, both within the American Democracy Project, and beyond. We wanted to capture the best insights, perspectives, and examples that we could find and share then with others for use in the upcoming and future election cycles.” Mehaffy’s words still ring true today; ADP’s electoral voices efforts continue as part of our Political Engagement Project, as well as through campus-specific programs and our affiliation with the Campus Vote Project. These efforts may be even more important now given the number of states with new Voter ID laws that may disproportionally effect college students.

This volume focuses on voter education, voter registration, and voter participation, as well as on how best to assess these efforts.

Below you’ll find the Table of Contents for the monograph. We hope you’ll read and share this work as we all work together to ensure that our students are prepared to be informed, engaged citizens – not only in the public sphere, but also at the polls.

Electoral Voices: Engaging College Students in Elections                          (Edited by Jim Perry)

• Foreword, George Mehaffy (Vice President, Academic Leadership and Change, AASCU)
• Introduction, Jim Perry (Campus ADP Director, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis)
• Voter Registration, Harry Basehart (Co-Director, PACE Institute, Salisbury University) and Jim Perry
• Voter Education, Richard Kendrick (ADP Campus Coordinator, SUNY Cortland) and Jim Perry
• Voter Participation, Matthew Manweller (Assistant Professor of Political Science) and Jim Perry
• Assessing Electoral Engagement, Elizabeth Bennion (ADP Campus Director, Indiana University South Bend)
• Challenges, Pitfalls and Lessons, Jim Perry
• References
• Appendix I: Campus Case Studies
• Appendix II: Case Study Template
• Appendix III: AASCU Survey of Member Institutions
• Appendix IV: Organizations Increasing Youth’s Electoral Voice
• Acknowledgements, Jim Perry

Download the Electoral Voices (2006) monograph here.

Partner Spotlight: Student Voting Update from FELN’s Campus Vote Project

Student Voting Update for March 12, 2012

Posted by Josh Spaulding

The Fair Elections Legal Network’s Campus Vote Project is excited to launch its new weekly update that focuses on news across the country related to students’ ability to vote. Young people are constantly underrepresented when it comes to voting. While many attribute the low turnout to apathy, specific barriers to the ballot disproportionately affect young people generally and students specifically.

Students, in particular, face additional obstacles to voting as they move to a new community for school. These challenges include not knowing voter registration rules and deadlines, not having acceptable ID for voter registration or voting purposes, confusion about where to vote, lack of transportation to the polls, and occasionally are confronted by unfriendly or unsympathetic elections officials or poll workers.

There are several ways for students, administrators, and election officials to help get students the information they need to register and vote. This weekly update will highlight what is being done on campuses and in the states to get students the information to participate and make voting more accessible as well as legislation that is specifically targeted to limit students’ access to the ballot. These are just a few examples from the past month. Please let us know of any recent on campuses or in the states that will impact students’ access to the ballot. Send your email to info@campusvoteproject.org.

To view non-student specific legislation that will impact access to voting, please visit FELN biweekly update on voter suppression legislation.

If you are interested in joining the new campaign FELN launched, Campus Vote Project, to help get students to the polls, please sign up at www.campusvoteproject.org.

Georgia

In the recent Presidential primary in Georgia, turnout among young voters was only 5%. A local TV station asked students at Albany State University why they didn’t vote. The students responded that they were unaware of the primary election date or that they were registered in their hometown.

Indiana

Students at Ball State University made their case before the Delaware County Election Board for an early satellite voting site on the Ball State campus. Currently, the campus is split into four different precincts with most of the polling locations over a mile from campus. Ball State President Joann Gora was supportive of the idea in 2008, the last time students tried to get a satellite voting site on campus.

Florida

The University of Miami, Miami-Dade Community College, and Florida International University have partnered with Turbovote, an online tool to help students vote. In the next few months, students will be able to start the voter registration process as well as apply for an absentee ballot through Turbovote. Students will be mailed ballots and will receive email and text message remainders as the election nears to either vote the absentee ballot or show up to vote in person on Election Day. FELN provides strategic advice and legal analysis for Turbovote.

Maryland

Although the Maryland General Assembly will not consider new legislation this year, the Student Government Association at the University of Maryland voted 20-0 to call on the legislature to introduce and pass same-day registration in a future legislative session. They noted that states with same-day registration saw an increase in student voters, including an analysis by the California Institute of Technology showing that same-day registration increased turnout of young adults (18-25 year olds) by 9.1 percent.

Minnesota

As lawmakers try to move through a bill in the Minnesota legislature that will put on the November ballot a constitutional amendment requiring a photo ID to vote, the League of Women Voters Minnesota produced a video showing how the law will effect voters – especially students. Among them is a graduate student who has, like many other students, moved 12 times in the past 6 years for internships, work, and when the school year ends. The proposed amendment will add a new barrier to voting for students in a state that has traditionally seen higher levels of student voting because of Election Day registration.

New Hampshire

The House passed legislation two weeks ago that would require a person’s voting address be their residence for all other legal purposes, impacting hundreds of laws and statutes that contain the words residency and domicile. For instance, a person would be required to change their drivers’ license and vehicle registration if it did not match the address they use for voter registration. The bill will likely prevent out of state college students from voting in New Hampshire unless they change their legal residence from their home state to New Hampshire. The bill heads to the Senate.

North Carolina

The upcoming vote on a constitutional amendment to ban same sex marriage in North Carolina has activated students on the Duke University campus to make voting more convenient for students ahead of the spring election. The Duke Student Government got a one-stop early voting site on campus – allowing students to both register and cast a ballot at the same time.

Ohio

Warren G. Harding High School took a group of students who will be 18 by the November general election to vote in Ohio’s primary election on Wednesday. Dozens more students from Warren City Schools are expected also be bused to vote in the primary.

Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania Senate passed a voter photo ID law that allows for student IDs from a Pennsylvania college or university to be acceptable ID if the student ID contains a photo, the student’s name, and an expiration date proving that it is still valid. The bill moves back to the House for agreement and then to Governor Tom Corbett to sign. Governor Corbett has said he is in favor of requiring photo IDs to vote.

Texas

The Black Student Alliance at San Antonio College in Texas recently conducted a voter registration drive to educate students on the importance of voting. They were able to register 90 students and plan to hold two more voter registration drives before the November election.

Vermont

Vermont voters passed a constitutional amendment in 2010 that now allows 17 year olds that will be 18 by the general election to vote in the upcoming presidential and August primary.

Virginia

SB 1 passed the Senate on February 6 with a 20-20 vote with the lieutenant governor casting the tie-breaking vote. SB 1 allows an ID card from any 4 year school of higher education in Virginia – including private schools – to serve as voting ID. Those who cannot provide an ID will no longer be able to sign a sworn statement of identity to vote by regular ballot and will instead have to vote by provisional ballot and show required ID later. The House concurred and the bill has been sent to Governor Bob McDonnell.

For the primary this past week, Liberty University was able to get a polling location on campus for students to vote. Previously, students had to take a bus to the polling location. Close to 600 people voted on at the polling place on campus.

Wisconsin

Wisconsin’s photo ID law was temporarily suspended pending trial over a lawsuit over the new law. Last’s month primary election required photo ID – which also allowed student ID’s – but as of now are not required to show a photo ID in the upcoming primary election because of the injunction. The new law that has been suspended only allows student IDs to serve as IDs if they have a photo, name, signature, date of issuance, and a 2-year expiration date. Students also must bring a letter from their school indicating that they are currently enrolled to be able to use a student ID. One student writes about the complications she encountered trying to vote under the new law, including printing the enrollment verification form.

The Madison Student Voter Coalition and the University of Wisconsin – Madison conducted a voter education awareness campaign prior to Tuesday’s primary.

The Wisconsin Senate passed a bill that would no longer require that voter registration to be offered to students in high school. It now heads to the Wisconsin Assembly.

The University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire is issuing voter IDs to students that do not have acceptable forms of identification to vote but are charging students $2 to obtain one. The Chippewa Valley Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to the school urging them to provide the IDs for free.

Whether or not technical school IDs are acceptable forms of identification is now in the hands of Gov. Scott Walker. He must approve the official policy written and approved by the Government Accountability Board that allows IDs issued by technical schools for voting.

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Re-posted with permission from The Campus Vote Project Blog.

Student Spotlight: Improving Student Voting at MTSU

By Brandon Loso, Sophomore, Middle Tennessee State University

Hello, fellow ADP members! We wanted to inform you of some of the projects that the American Democracy Project students at Middle Tennessee State University have been working on this year.  For those of you who may be unaware of the capacity and involvement of students at MTSU, we are the largest undergraduate university in the state of Tennessee, with approximately 26,000 undergraduates in the student body.  Our ADP at MTSU consists of both faculty and students, and some of our ADP students earn academic credit doing experiential learning practica in civic learning and engagement during the academic year.  We are a comparatively small group, but we make some big contributions on campus!

Brandon Loso busily in the middle of voter registration at MTSU. Brandon is second from the right, with dark hair, in profile assisting students.

With the presidential elections coming up this year — Tennessee participates in Super Tuesday primary this week, March 6, 2012 — ADP has been and is continuing to work to educate and encourage our MTSU students to voice their opinions in national, state, and local elections.  Members of our own ADP MTSU faculty are moderating League of Women Voters candidate fora for city, county, and state elections this spring and summer, toward that very end.  As an educational device for our incoming students, we ADP MTSU students are in the process of creating a voter education seminar for new MTSU students, as well as a pamphlet to be included in the new student orientation packet for first-year students who enter the university starting this summer. Our flyer contains basic information about how to get registered to participate in summer and fall ballots, to be ready to vote in the upcoming city, county, state, and national elections.

Another important way in which ADP MTSU students are involved in bettering the election process for our students is partnering with the local election commission and with campus officials to develop a polling location on our campus— we hope — as a valuable resource for university students residing in dorms and campus apartments and in surrounding neighborhoods.  Believe it or not, MTSU has not ever had an on-campus or adjacent-to-campus polling site, which is difficult to understand given the size of our university population.  ADP has been lobbying to develop an on-campus polling location for quite some time.  We persevere in that effort.

We are doing on-campus research this spring that we think will support and further our position for an on-campus voting site with both the election commission and our university administration.  Additionally, we think our research will assist in the effort to increase the number of students who are registered voters.

With help from faculty from the MTSU Poll (http://mtsusurveygroup.org/), ADP students have developed a survey to ask our student body about registration, voter participation, polling location, and voting process.  Our survey is under way all across our campus right now, and we hope to present the results of the study at the American Democracy Project annual meeting in San Antonio in June.

The survey is quite simple.  We naturally ask demographic basics of our respondents, including age, gender, and class at MTSU.  The survey itself consists of ten questions pertaining to students’ personal registration and voting habits and their opinions about the voting process.  We are anxious to secure a representative sample that will properly reflect the percentage of our student community currently registered to vote.  We also hope to determine, so that we can share with the local county election commission, the percentage of the student population that does vote, or intends to vote, right here in our own university town — vs. the percentage of our school that travels to other in-state counties to vote or that participates in out-of-state voting. (View MTSU’s Voting Survey here.)

To examine the impacts of home and peers, the survey inquires of each respondent about his or her culture of voting, whether family members vote and whether friends do.  Our survey additionally asks students for self-evaluation on how important voting in major elections is to them personally.  We believe that if we can pinpoint the average numbers of students who feel voting is an important aspect of their civic life, but are restricted in voting due to limited access or lack of resources as college students, we will have the statistical support we need to work more productively with our campus administration and with the local election commission to develop improved voting options for our student body.

As you can see, MTSU’s American Democracy Project is working to make a difference for our school and the involvement on campus.  We are very excited to see how all of our efforts pan out over the next several months, and we’re very anxious to see you all in San Antonio, Texas, really soon!

Learn more about ADP at MTSU here.

About Brandon Loso

Brandon Loso manning an ADP table at an MTSU student organization fair.

Hey, fellow American Democracy Project students!  My name is Brandon Loso.  I am a sophomore at Middle Tennessee State University from Bell Buckle, Tennessee.  I am currently majoring in Mass Communications of Advertising and Public Relations in the Recording Industry, and minoring in Business Administration.  Throughout my four semesters at MTSU I have become very involved in student organizations and have been given the opportunity to hold leadership positions in several.  I am currently the American Democracy Project Student Org Vice President, Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity Community Service Chairman, Up ‘Til Dawn for St. Jude’s Team Leader, and member of the Student Government Association Homecoming Committee. 

ADP Partners with Fair Elections Legal Network’s new Campus Vote Project

The American Democracy Project and our Political Engagement Project are proud to partner with the Fair Election Legal Network’s new Campus Vote Project.

The new Campus Vote Project is a non-partisan campaign to help college students work with administrators and local election officials to make the process of voting easier and overcome barriers students often face to voting that students often mention such as residency laws, registration deadlines, and strict voter ID requirements.

I hope you’ll consider connecting your campus with the Campus Vote Project!

- Jen Domagal-Goldman, National Manager, American Democracy Project

To learn more, go here. 

Download the free Campus Vote Project Toolkit here.

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Guest blog post by Dan Vicuna, CVP Coordinator

Concerned about youth being underrepresented in the upcoming election? Our colleagues over at Fair Elections Legal Network launched Campus Vote Project (CVP) to provide college students and administrators with the tools and support to institutionalize best practices on campuses in order to provide voter information, increase student participation in elections and overcome barriers to the ballot often faced by students.

Students face unique obstacles to voting including not knowing voter registration rules and deadlines; not having acceptable ID for voter registration or voting purposes; confusion about where to vote; a lack of transportation to the polls; and occasionally, being confronted by unfriendly or unsympathetic election officials or poll workers. And it’s getting worse with the introduction of new voter suppression laws across the country that shorten early voting periods, require a voter ID that many students lack, and place onerous restrictions on groups holding registration drives.

Campus Vote Project addresses these barriers and will work with students and college administrators to overcome them on college campuses.

For more information on the project visit www.campusvoteproject.org and follow them on Twitter @campusvote. You can also read the CVP blog here.

Raising Recycling Awareness & Voter Participation at MTSU

Guest Blog Post by Victoria Womack, Student, Middle Tennessee State University

Raising Recycling Awareness and Voter Participation

American Democracy Project seeks to solve problems within our local community and on campus, and during 2011 and on into this year, we the students of American Democracy Project at Middle Tennessee State University identified  two major problems affecting MTSU that we wanted to try to begin to tackle on our campus.

MTSU Students (from L to R): L to R: Carlin Stinson, Matthew Foriest, Victoria Womack & Brandon Loso

One problem has been a lack of awareness about campus recycling.  We saw the recycling bins often getting underused, while at the same time the trash bins seemed to pile up and overflow!  So we brainstormed, talked to a lot of facilities people on campus and to other campus organizations, and decided on a few tactics we wanted to undertake toward improving the current situation.

The new student orientation program that MTSU hosts every spring and summer for incoming freshmen and transfer students is called CUSTOMS on our campus, during which new students are given tours of campus and are treated to presentations about every aspect of how the campus operates.  Of course the students leave orientation loaded with brochures and handouts about organizations, programs, and student services.  ADP decided to create a brochure to go in the CUSTOMS packets that will be given to all new students this coming summer that will inform them about MTSU’s recycling services.  We wanted to stress to the new students the importance of recycling; to work toward building a healthier campus culture by starting early with our incoming students; and also to simply provide new students with basic, introductory recycling information that they all need to know.  We wanted to supply answers to straightforward questions.  Do all the dorms have bins?  Does every floor?  Does every academic hall and classroom?  How often are the bins collected?  Where is the main campus recycling center? Where are hazardous waste and electronic equipment recycled?  What does Facilities Services collect on campus, v. what does each individual student need to transport personally to the larger campus recycling center?  Questions like that.

We hope our new brochure will be a good addition to help students start off on the right foot here.  We were not provided that sort of information when we arrived at MTSU, and we think we should have been.  So we’re handling it ourselves because it’s something we care about.

The other problem we are taking on is a serious attempt to increase the student voting base at MTSU in preparation for the 2012 presidential election.  Due to the lack of heavy student participation in the fall 2010 elections, during which election cycle Tennessee selected our current governor, we were discouraged by the general apathy toward voting by many of our students.  We have read the national data on this issue, as have you, about poor voter turnout among our age group, but we are interpreting some of the disengagement on our campus, and maybe much of it, in part to the lack of prepared registration:  to students generally being uninformed about registration.  We hope that receiving information about how to register will increase the numbers of students getting registered, to be ready to vote November 6th!

We are using a multi-pronged approach in dealing with this issue in the months ahead.  Just one of our approaches is an attempt at tackling the problem in a similar way in which we are dealing with recycling:  we have decided to also include an informational flyer in the CUSTOMS packets this summer about voter registration.  We compiled a list of the recurring questions that were asked of us throughout the past year when we had voter registration tables set up on campus.  We set out to answer those questions in the best, most efficient ways we can, writing down our tips in simple responses for our freshmen, most of whom will be first time voters this coming fall.  We want to show them that registering to vote is easy.  We want them to be sure they know that registration is the required first step in being able to participate in the election to put forth their voice in the political arena.  We want to help them get registered – and then get to the polls.

Information is power. We respect our fellow students and presume they genuinely want to do the right thing.  They just need to be encouraged.  We think information about a subject leads to action.  Ideally we would love for everyone on campus to participate in voting this fall.  We know the sheer act of flipping the levers in the voting booth can be life changing.  Voting makes a citizen of even the very cynical.  If we can raise the voter participation numbers among our campus population by the slightest percentage come fall 2012, we’ll have accomplished a lot.  But even if we’re able to facilitate just one more MTSU student becoming a participatory citizen, we’ll feel good about our efforts and know that our goal has been accomplished!  We’re working on it, and we hope we’re modeling civic agency and civic action in the process.

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Victoria Womack

Victoria Womack is a soldier in the Tennessee National Guard and a full time student at Middle Tennessee State University. She is majoring in Digital Animation and hopes to one day start her own company.  She became involved in civic engagement through her experiences in the military as well as her involvement with the American Democracy Project.  She hopes to promote the importance of voting as well as staying actively involved with government issues.

Obama Gets Second Term in WIU Student Mock Presidential Election November 9, 2011

Earlier this month, Western Illinois University staged what’s thought to be the largest student-run mock election even in the nation. WIU’s Mock Presidential Election (MPE), “The Road to the White House Starts at Western Illinois University” was an ADP-sponsored event designed to actively engage students in the political process. You can read the press release from WIU’s University Relations below.

- Jen Domagal-Goldman, ADP National Manager

 

The Road to the White House Starts at Western Illinois University

WIU Mock Presidential Election

MACOMB, IL — It’s official. The next president of the United States will be the incumbent, Barack Obama, according to students participating in Western Illinois University’s Mock Presidential Election (MPE). And in a surprise move for vice president, students voted Joe Biden out and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in.

The fifth and final night of the Mock Presidential Election, known as “The Road to the White House Starts at Western Illinois University,” found early voting bouncing between candidates they nominated from three parties: Democrats for Obama/Clinton, GOP’s ticket Mitt Romney/Paul Ryan and Green Party’s Jill Stein/Kent Mesplay.

Stein, who made it a three-candidate race in the national electorate, kicked-off her actual presidential campaign as a Green Party candidate at the Nov. 7 simulation, addressed the students gathered in Western Hall saying the spirit of democracy was alive and well at Western Illinois University. She challenged students to think of this campaign as a chance to speak up and to vote on their own behalf.

WIU student campaign managers and other leaders in the Democrat and GOP ranks, spoke on behalf of their presidential nominees.

When it came down to states voting, several states deadlocked, and without a declared winner, their electoral votes could not be allowed, said Rick Hardy, MPE executive co-director.

ACCOLADES

“We would like to thank all of the participants, students, faculty, staff, volunteers and candidates and their spokespersons, for taking part in the 2011 Mock Presidential Election. The collaborative partnerships are what makes an event of this magnitude such a success,” said WIU President Jack Thomas. “Coordinators Rick Hardy and John Hemingway and our students are to be commended for their initiative and hard work in planning, coordinating and organizing this largest student-run mock election event in the nation.”

Hardy added his appreciation for the students who made this event a success.

“I would particularly like to commend the work of the students who were exemplary leaders, especially D’Angelo Taylor (senior, political science major), Cesar Salas (senior, political science, Hoffman Estates, IL), Tucker Copi (senior, political science, Springfield, IL), Jenna Verity (senior, political science, Schaumburg, IL), Caleb Markey (sophomore, finance major, Macomb, IL), Megan Tatro (senior, law enforcement and justice administration major, Rock Island, IL), James Brenner (junior, political science/American government major, Machesney Park, IL) and Wayne Pierce (Chicago),” Hardy noted.

Hardy also echoed President Thomas’ thanks:

“‘The Road to the White House Starts at Western Illinois University’” involved a tremendous University-wide and community effort that deserves great thanks. We cannot thank everyone enough for assisting in this outstanding exercise that is part of the American Democracy Project (ADP)….To all, we say thank you.”

The American Democracy Project is an initiative of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU) that began in 2003, in partnership with The New York Times, focused on higher education’s role in preparing the next generation of informed, engaged citizens for the our democracy, Hardy added.

WIU Mock Presidential Election

STUDENTS IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Hardy was quick to acknowledge the many students who worked the mock election, many of whom assisted in ways related directly to their academic fields.

“Broadcasting students reported each night’s event live on wiutv3, journalism students wrote editorials and news copy (http://control–shift.blogspot.com), the ROTC Color Guard started each session with the presentation of the colors, School of Music singers and the Marching Band participated and many more behind-the-scene students, including recreation, park and tourism administration students who helped with event management, along with academic and honorary organizations, help made this year’s Mock Presidential Election an overwhelming success,” said Hardy. “I know there will be a lot more Western Illinois University students following the 2012 Presidential Election, all the way from state primaries and caucuses to election night coverage; and I believe there will be a lot more WIU students voting in this election.””

ADVICE FROM THE FIELD

Congressman Aaron Schock (Peoria), who, at 30, is the youngest member of the United States Congress, spoke to the students about his journey in politics, beginning as a successful write-in candidate for school board at 19-years old. He was the youngest member elected as an Illinois State Representative in 2004, and the first member of the U.S. Congress to be born in the 1980s.

Shock told the students that serving on the school board, or in the state general assembly, or in Congress, “is a lot like high school. If you show up, do your homework, ask intelligent questions, put forward thoughtful ideas and effort, you will be successful.”

POLITICIANS SUPPORTED MPE

Throughout the five-day Mock Presidential Election, several noted politicians and spokespersons of politicians took the time to come to Macomb to speak to the students simulating America’s election process.

In addition to Schock and Stein, speakers included Illinois Treasurer Dan Rutherford, State Rep. Norine Hammond, State Rep. Mike Boland and presidential candidate Randall Terry. Other representatives included Debra Detmers Fansler, district director for U.S. Rep. John Shimkus; Farheen Hakeem, National Green Party co-chair; and Collin Hitt, senior director of government affairs at the Illinois Policy Institute in Springfield.

For more information about WIU’s Mock Presidential Election, follow this link.

You Can Do It, Too: The SUNY Fredonia Story

The SUNY Fredonia Story

By Caitlin Levesque, former student, SUNY Fredonia

SUNY Fredonia student volunteers get out the vote.

Two years ago, I was in the middle of my summer internship in Washington, D.C. at the same time Barack Obama became the Democratic front-runner for the 2008 Presidential election. It was at that moment, being in D.C., that I realized State University of New York (SUNY) Fredonia students needed to capitalize on this historic opportunity to become civically engaged; and I would be their cheerleader.

There were several obstacles that stood in my way: low voter turnout rate in the past, lack of interest in political issues and elections, high dissatisfaction with the government, and most importantly, an underlying sense of disenfranchisement amongst youth voters.

How we did it!

So, how did SUNY Fredonia register 1,065 new voters and have an 88% turnout rate on November 4^th, 2008? I quickly realized that I was unable to transform our students’ perception on my own, and began to use my relationships with professors, student groups and, most importantly, my friends to help implement this non-partisan campaign. By weekly tabling, knocking on dorm room doors, invading classrooms, hosting open mic nights, and causing quite a ruckus, our team registered over a thousand students in just under five weeks.

Getting Students to the Polls

Then the biggest struggle began: how do we get these registered voters to the

Teach-in that helped students learn more about the issues on the ballot.

polls? By connecting with our local TV and radio stations, as well as newspapers we were able to put out ads that told students exactly where to go and when. Realizing how detrimental it would be to have a group of uninformed first-time voters heading to the polls, we decided to work with several students with expertise in the economy, environment, and foreign policy fields to develop three teach-ins discussing these areas.  Total turnout at these events exceeded 200 students.  Next we began to focus our time and

Uncle Sam and Abe Lincoln are enlisted to help get out the vote.

energy on planning for Election Day. From chalking polling information all over our campus’ concrete, to hanging banners directing people where to go to vote, to enlisting our own “Abe Lincoln” and “Uncle Sam” to invade dining halls, libraries and classrooms, we transformed the SUNY Fredonia campus. We were able to engage students and volunteers who finally understood the issues and saw the importance of young voter participation in the election. Most importantly, our efforts helped to flip our county from red to blue, putting Fredonia on the electoral map like never before.

What can you do?

In order to replicate SUNY Fredonia’s success, we need to advocate for strong civic programs in our colleges.  Studies show that first time voters make lifetime voters.  By advocating for youth turnout in and around campuses across our country for the 2010 Midterm elections, we can create a voter bloc that will be influential in the 2012 election and beyond. By understanding your audience, and educating yourself on issues that students can relate to; we can create a citizenry of youth voters and help keep our country on track.

If you’re looking for a way to get started on connecting with like-minded young people helping to promote civic engagement, check out some of these sites:

• Civic Youth offers a wide range of statistics as well as State Election Laws
• Rock the Vote allows student leaders to download toolkits to help start a voter registration campaign
• On The Issues is a necessary tool If you are trying to inform your new voters on key issues that will encourage them to get to the polls

YVO: Civic Engagement in a Global Framework

By Clair Whitmer, Voter Outreach Director for the Overseas Vote Foundation

Those of us living abroad are often acutely aware of our “American-ness”. Many of us participate in forms of civic engagement in our overseas communities, but voting in U.S. federal elections remains one of the most important ties to the civic life of our home country.

This is especially true for young people: students studying abroad, volunteers or young professionals like the worldwide network of English teachers.

When they move abroad, many of these young citizens become aware for the first time of what it really means to be American, to themselves, and to people they meet. We know that if we can associate that experience with the act of casting a ballot, voting may very well become a lifetime habit

That’s our goal with Youth Vote Overseas (YVO), an offshoot of Overseas Vote Foundation (OVF) that we launched in 2008 at the American Democracy Project Annual Meeting.

OVF is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that delivers online voting tools and information to make voting simpler and faster for voters living outside the U.S. Our YVO initiative is intended to build a network of young voters abroad that encourgage their peers to participate and spread the word about YVO’s online voter services.

We particularly depend on universities and colleges, like those represented by the ADP membership, to help deliver a simple message to students and faculty who are overseas on Election Day: you have the right to vote from wherever you are and YVO is there to help you do it.

We are grateful for the continued support of ADP and AASCU, which has done so much to help YVO reach its target audience.

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Matthew Segal, head of the Student Association for Voter Empowerment, at the OVF Summit 2010 in Munich. What do overseas and young voters have in common? It’s about citizenship, not partisanship

Talking to: OVF’s Clair Whitmer about the Importance of Overseas Voters