The US Presidential election is coming up in November of 2024, yet voter registration day is just around the corner.
National Voter Registration is Wednesday, Sept.20. To help make sure the Lewis Community is upholding their civic duty, information tables on how to register to vote will be up around campus starting the week of Sept. 18.
Tables will be outside of Charlie’s Place, in the Brown James Gaffney Student Center, as well as throughout the Academic Science building.
The university is making registering to vote an easy task. With the entering of some information, Turbovote is a quick and easy way for students, along with faculty and staff, to easily register to vote. Turbovote can be accessed by going to: lewisu.turbovote.org
Turbovote covers all your voting needs such as registering to vote, checking your registration status, voting early, voting by mail, information on voting in person and where to find your nearest poll.
Dr. Justin Delacour, president of the university’s Civic Engagement Committee comments.
“The university’s nonpartisan Civic Engagement Committee encourages people to register to vote and to vote in elections because politics affects people’s lives,” said Delacour.
“Everything from the quality and safety of our roads to the educational performance of our schools is affected by politics and the budgetary priorities of our local, state, and federal governments. Moreover, the more that people participate in politics, the more informed they become about it, meaning that the quality of their participation improves.”
The University has had an increase in the amount of students registering to vote.
“Between 2012 and 2020, our students’ voter registration rate increased almost 10 percentage points, from 74% to 83.9%” said Delacour.
“Student voter turnout increased at an even higher rate, from 50.6% in 2012 to 67.4% in 2020.”
With presidential elections coming up in the next year, there is hope to have as many students as possible participate in the election process. The presidential primary election will be held on March 19, 2024 and the presidential general election, when the United States chooses its president, is scheduled for Nov. 5, 2024.
