Public participation is a key component of a healthy democracy. That’s why the Student PIRGs’ New Voters Project and Ohio PIRG Student Chapters worked to engage and turn out voters in 2008.
Across the country, the New Voters Project used tried and true pavement pounding (we deployed 80 organizers to 100 campuses in 17 states) and new technology (we sent a quarter of a million text messages to young voters to remind them to vote) to register and turn new voters out to the polls on Nov. 4.
On Oberlin’s campus, Ohio PIRG students and the Coalition for Oberlin Voters registered over 2,000 students. We helped to promote early voting by bringing over 1,200 students to the Board of Elections to cast early ballots, and we educated students about their rights at the polls.
This year, more people voted for president than ever before in our nation’s history, and the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement estimates that 2.2 million more young people voted in 2008 than in the last presidential election in 2004.
If you helped out with our election work, thanks and congratulations. Boosting voter turnout, especially among first-time voters, is key to a strong representative democracy in 2009 and for years to come.
