Student Engagement

“Our future cannot depend on the government alone. The ultimate solutions lie in the attitudes and the actions of the American people.”

―Joe Biden, 47th Vice President of the United States

As we count down to Election Day on November 6, 2018, the Center for Political Communication is partnering with the Biden Institute to increase voter registration and nonpartisan civic engagement across the University of Delaware campus and the state of Delaware. Under the leadership of graduate and undergraduate UD students, the "Make It Count" campaign attacks apathy, inspires a culture of civic engagement, and inspires its participants to become lifelong ambassadors for democratic involvement. The campaign will keep students informed and involved on relevant policy topics through on-campus initiatives such as voter engagement drives, facilitated living-room-style conversations on the issues of the day, educational programs, and on-campus events.

To learn more about the upcoming "Make It Count" events and initiatives, please visit sppa.udel.edu/bideninstitute. To learn more about the CPC's National Agenda programs, please visit udel.edu/nationalagenda.

​Voting should be easy. Now UD students can register to vote, change their registration address, request an absentee ballot, and get reminders about upcoming elections through TurboVote, an online service by Democracy Works. To get started, please visit udel.turbovote.org. Registrants will receive a completed voter registration form in the mail to be signed and returned. All forms are sent with pre-addressed and pre-stamped envelopes. Even if you're already registered to vote, the “Make It Count” campaign urges you to register with TurboVote to receive timely election reminders! As Mr. Biden often reminds us, elections are about who we are as a people. As students and future leaders, your participation, your ideas, and your voices will continue to push this country forward.

Read the news story about National Voter Registration Day.

The University of Delaware celebrated National Voter Registration Day with a voter engagement drive at Trabant Food Court on Tuesday, September 25. As part of the semester-long Make It Count campaign, volunteers from the Biden Institute and the Center for Political Communication were on hand to educate the University of Delaware community and help voters get registered. Joe Biden, the 47th Vice President of the United States, made a surprise appearance along with his sister, Valerie Biden. In the words of Mr. Biden, "Make sure you're registered to vote. It's easy, it's quick and by the way it's your responsibility."

As part of the Make it Count initiative to make every student's voice count, CPC Associate Director Dr. Lindsay Hoffman moderated a Living Room Conversation for students at the Trabant Theater on Thursday, October 25. In advance of the 2018 midterm elections on November 6, Dr. Hoffman and a bipartisan panel of student leaders (Jaqueline Brown, Eric Hastings, Lindsay Hoffman, Morgan Kelly and Jacob Wasserman) answered questions from the audience based on the theme of "To Vote or Not to Vote?" 

In its September/October 2018 issue, Washington Monthly named the University of Delaware ​one of only 58 colleges to meet all four criteria for commitment to encouraging voting by its students.

In 2016, the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge awarded the University of Delaware a bronze seal for having a student voting rate between 50% and 59%. The ALL IN Challenge is a national competition for universities to increase voter engagement on college campuses. With guidance from CPC Associate Director Lindsay Hoffman, the University of Delaware has continued its commitment to increasing voter engagement in 2018. Read more about UD's 2018 ALL IN Action Plan and other reports via the ALL IN Participating Campuses page.

Student participation in elections has increased in the past few years. A recent report, "Democracy Counts: A Report on U.S. College and University Student Voting" from the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement, an initiative of Tufts University's Institute for Democracy in Higher Education, shows that between the 2012 presidential election, and the 2016 presidential election, student voting went from 45.1% of eligible voters in 2012 to 48.3% in 2016―a 7% improvement. 

"I am proud to honor the University of Delaware with an ALL IN Challenge bronze seal in recognition of their dedication, hard work, and achievement," said Zaneeta E. Daver, director of the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge. "The University of Delaware is not only ensuring that a more representative population participates in our nation's democracy, but is educating students to be civic-minded. They are an example to be emulated."

The All IN Challenge encourages higher education institutions to help students form the habits of active and informed citizenship, and make democratic participation a core value on their campus. By joining the Challenge, campuses commit to:

1. Convening a campus-wide committee that includes members from academic affairs, student affairs, and the student body, as well as any other relevant stakeholders; 
2. Developing and implementing an action plan to improve democratic engagement; 
3. Participating in the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE) in order to measure student voting rates; and 
4. Sharing their campus' action plan and NSLVE results in order to be eligible for a recognition seal and/or awards. 

More than 300 campuses, enrolling more than 4 million students, have joined the Challenge since its launch in summer 2016.