How to Get out the Student Vote

A Briefing Paper by Sujatha Jahagirdar, Program Director, Student PIRGs' New Voters Project

In the weeks leading up to Election Day, the Student PIRGs' New Voters Project will run the largest on the ground non-partisan effort in the country to turn out young voters on November 4th - targeting students on 100 campuses in 17 states. This massive student ‘get out the vote’ drive - spearheaded by thousands of volunteers across the country – is rooted in 25 years of experience and based on a host of studies that point toward the efficacy of such efforts in maximizing youth turnout.

Pounding the Pavement

Studies conducted by a range of experts indicate that multiple peer-to-peer contacts through canvass, phone-banking and other traditional grassroots organizing methods can significantly increase young voter turnout.

Get out the Vote canvasses and phone banks work. A 2000 Yale University study found that turnout by individuals canvassed by the Student PIRGs' New Voters Project before Election Day was between 10.9 and 12.3 percentage points higher than the control group. A second 2000 Yale University study found that turnout among individuals called by a Student PIRG volunteer before Election Day were 5 percentage points higher than the control group.

Multiple peer-to-peer contact increases an individuals’ likelihood to vote. An additional study of the Student PIRGs' New Voters Project by Polimetrix in 2004 found that contacting voters multiple times increases an individual’s likelihood of voting - for example, individuals who were contacted at least three times turned out at a rate of 83.4 percent, compared to a 76.4 percent rate among those contacted just once.

Contacts close to Election Day matter most. The Polimetrix study also found that individuals contacted in the 72 hours before the close of polls turned out at a rate of 81 to 85 percent (depending on the timing of contact) versus 79 percent for those individuals last contacted 4-8 days beforehand, and 69 percent for those last contacted nine or more days beforehand.

Wiring the Web

Technology can also increase young voter turnout. A study released by the Student PIRGs' New Voters Project, Credo Mobile and researchers at Princeton University and the University of Michigan found that text message reminders sent the eve of an election can increase youth turnout by four percent.

With this in mind, the Student PIRGs are organizing 'text out the vote' tables across the country, where thousands of students will be urged to text their friends 'get out the vote' reminders.

A new Facebook application will allow students to send vote reminders to their friend list and set goals to get their friends out to vote.

Over the next twenty days, the Student PIRGs' New Voters Project will merge the on-the-ground and on-line tactics described above on one hundred campuses across the country to maximize young voter turnout on Election Day. In the three remaining weeks before Election Day, we will establish 190,000 contacts with young voters, urging them to the polls. A detailed outline of our model is available at www.newvotersproject.org.

States with active Student PIRG campus Get out the Vote Efforts: AZ, CA, CO, CT, FL, IA, IN, MA, MD, ME, MO, MT, NC, NJ, NM, IL, OH, OR, PA, WA, WI

The Student PIRGs' New Voters Project is the nation’s largest youth voter mobilization program. Since 2004, we have registered more than 700,000 young people and made more than 650,000 peer to peer voter turnout contacts to get young people to the polls on Election Day. Due in large part to our efforts, the youth vote increased by 4.3 million votes, or 9% in 2004 and an analysis of our work in 2006 found that in the student dense precincts in which we worked with our allies, youth voter turnout increased on average by 157%.