A major campus voter registration effort has netted Siena a national award for its participation.
The All In Campus Democracy Challenge announced its third biennial awards on November 8 to recognize select higher education institutions, educators, and students for their exceptional work in student voter engagement during the 2020 presidential election. Siena received a Silver Award for a voter turnout rate of 68 percent, up from 43 percent in 2016. The actual registration rate was even higher: 85 percent of Saints signed up to vote last November.
“The massive increase in voter turnout and civic engagement on campus is a testament to the hard work of the Voter Friendly Campus group,” said Daniel Lewis, Ph.D., associate professor of political science and international relations. “Despite the logistical challenges of trying to mobilize students in a pandemic, without the usual face-to-face campaigning and in-person political events, the students were able to engage their peers in new and creative ways, leading to the highest turnout in Siena’s recent history.”
The group, coordinated by Sami DeRagon ’22, helped raise awareness about voting, led voter registration education and sign-up drives, and encouraged students to get to the polls on Election Day.
Lewis and DeRagon said as the country heads into the 2022 election cycle, Siena students are already planning efforts to engage the campus in the upcoming Congressional and gubernatorial races. With pandemic restrictions subsiding, Voter Friendly Campus is working to supplement the successful virtual strategies from the 2020 election with more traditional face-to-face campaigning.
More than 840 institutions in the United States enrolling close to nine million students participated in the All In Challenge, a national, nonpartisan initiative of the non-profit Civic Nation, which believes that higher education plays a role in graduating students into voters and in closing electoral participation gaps that persist by race and age.
President Chris Gibson ’86, Ph.D., in one of his first initiatives as the College’s new leader in July 2020, oversaw Siena signing onto the challenge. He praised “the many organic initiatives and campus-wide voter drives clearly made a positive difference. The fact that our campus Democratic and Republican clubs worked together on this effort – and operated in good faith throughout – makes me all the more proud.”
“Increasing engagement in elections is something that helps to prepare all of us as students to be more engaged community members once we graduate. If we prioritize being engaged in our communities now, it becomes something that we all take with us as we graduate and becomes a part of our lives moving forward.”
Sami DeRagon ’22
“America has shown the entire world that we can be a self-governing people. As such, it is vitally important that we recognize our rights and responsibilities as citizens: to be aware of the issues, vet our candidates, express ourselves through the vote, and hold our elected leaders accountable.”
President Chris Gibson ’86, Ph.D.
