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Information They Can Trust: Increasing Youth Voter Turnout at the University

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 June 2008

Cynthia J. Bogard ,
Ian Sheinheit  and
Reneé P. Clarke
Cynthia J. Bogard
Affiliation:
Hofstra University
Ian Sheinheit
Affiliation:
University at Albany
Reneé P. Clarke
Affiliation:
Howard University
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Extract

In the 2004 presidential election, perhaps 54% of the nation's youngest cohort—dubbed “Generation Next” by some pollsters—cast a vote. This was a substantial increase over the 42% of eligible 18–25-year-olds who voted in the 2000 election (U.S. Census Bureau 2005; Pew Center 2007). Still, youth voting rates lagged behind the voting rates of those citizens older than 25–66% made their way to the polls on Election Day in 2004 (Lopez, Kirby, and Sagoff 2005). It is likely that voting rates will increase in the current youth cohort as they age, as has happened in both the Baby Boomer and Generation X cohorts. But transforming more of the large Generation Next cohort into voters earlier in adulthood could substantially increase democratic participation in upcoming elections and for decades to come, as habits of civic participation developed in youth often last a lifetime (Miller and Shanks 1996). Two-thirds of young people now enroll in some form of higher education. Colleges and universities of all types would therefore seem to be natural sites to mount efforts to improve youth voter turnout. And because interest in voting among the youngest adult cohort seems to be on the rise, this would seem to be the time to encourage more of such behavior. But how can institutions of higher learning best promote democratic participation, especially voting?

Type
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Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 41 , Issue 3 , July 2008 , pp. 541 - 546
Copyright
Copyright © The American Political Science Association 2008

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