Campus Voter Initiatie

Abstract

Based on information collected from the US Census Bureau, young Americans are the least likely demographic to vote. According to Common Cause, North Carolina, not only were students at ECU less likely to vote, ECU ranked nineteenth in voter turnout of all schools in North Carolina. Because of this, our honors group concluded that this was an issue that needed to be addressed. After the group found that classic get-out-to vote drives often yielded the best results for campaigns, our research group concluded that in order to increase voter participation among ECU’s students, we would use grassroots techniques to spur them to vote. This included as much face-to-face interaction as possible, centered around tabling events, registration drives, and bringing candidates on campus to interact directly with students. In order to achieve this, we founded the Camps Voter Initiative, and ran some events as well as a debate on ECU’s campus during the Fall of 2019 and Spring of 2020. However due to the COVID-19 pandemic, unforeseen hurdles were created. Thusly, the Campus Voter Initiative, in an effort to make some sort of impact on the 2020 election, partnered with the Association of Mexicans in Eastern North Carolina, and recruited the help of other campus organizations to run a Safe Site at the Willis Building, where we disseminated PPE, water, and voter guides.