• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Events
  • Civic Ed
  • Campaign Finance
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • Independent Voter News
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. young voters>

Students voted in record numbers last year. Will they turn out again in 2021?

Sara Swann
https://twitter.com/saramswann?lang=en
November 02, 2021
Student voters

Students at the University of Pittsburgh register their peers ahead of the 2020 election. The student voting rate last year reached an all-time high of 66 percent.

Aaron Jackendoff/Getty Images

One year after the contentious presidential election, voters are headed to the polls again Tuesday to decide a slate of key statewide and municipal contests. Young people will be an especially important voting bloc to watch after they turned out in record numbers last November.

Two-thirds of college students cast a ballot in the 2020 election, according to a report released last week by Tufts University's Institute for Democracy and Higher Education. This record turnout was a 14 percentage point jump from 2016, putting the student voting rate on par with the national average.

But Tuesday's elections will also be a test of the dozens of state voting laws enacted this year. While some states expanded access to the ballot box, others tightened rules around voting. And many of these new voting barriers will have a disparate impact on students, especially young people of color.


Despite higher education and the election being upended by the pandemic, students still turned out in droves for the 2020 presidential contest. More than four-fifths of eligible student voters registered, and of those registered voters, 80 percent cast a ballot, signifying young people's high motivation to get out the vote.

"We attribute this high level of participation to many factors, including student activism on issues such as racial injustice, global climate change and voter suppression, as well as increased efforts by educators to reach students and connect them to the issues and to voting resources," said IDHE Director Nancy Thomas.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Young voters face unique challenges because they are often first-time voters and they are highly mobile so their voting address is often subject to change. Educating young voters about the election process, as well as the many new laws enacted by state lawmakers this year is a high priority for civic engagement groups.

With limited in-person interactions due to Covid-19, colleges had to find innovative new ways to engage student voters. At the University of California, San Diego, school officials integrated voter registration with Covid-19 testing. Students were given a QR code to register to vote while waiting to be tested. At Piedmont Virginia Community College in Charlottesville, students take a civic engagement course within their major as part of a five-year plan to encourage civic learning and participation on campus.

UCSD's student voting rate was 71 percent in 2020, a 27-point surge from four years prior. Student turnout data for PVCC was not yet available.

The National Study of Learning, Voting and Engagement is the most comprehensive analysis of college and university student voting in the country. The study has been conducted by researchers at Tufts after every general and midterm election since 2012. This fifth iteration of the study collected data from nearly 1,200 campuses of all types, including community colleges, research universities, minority-serving and women's colleges, state universities and private institutions.

Nearly all the campuses included in the study (97 percent) saw increased voter turnout in the 2020 election. The youngest college students (18- and 19-year-olds) voted at slightly higher rates than their older peers.

Asian American students had the biggest increase in voter turnout: a 17-point jump from 2016 to 2020. While this boost was a significant improvement, Asian American student turnout (51 percent) still lagged 20 points behind white student turnout (71 percent).

At 66 percent, multiracial students had the second highest turnout rate behind white students, followed by Black students at 63 percent and Hispanic students at 60 percent.

Women students of all races and ethnicities continued to vote at higher rates than men. Overall, 64 percent of women cast a ballot in the 2020 election, compared to 58 percent of men. White women had the highest turnout rate at 73 percent, while Asian American men had the lowest at 46 percent.

Moving forward, researchers at Tufts will be exploring the different factors that motivate and hinder student voting. Those findings will be released in a second report later this fall.

From Your Site Articles
  • Young people found more ways to engage in politics in 2020 - The ... ›
  • Pandemic or not, young people remain key to elections - The Fulcrum ›
  • MTV launches campaign for more polling stations on campuses ... ›
  • Barriers to increasing the youth vote, and how to fix them - The ... ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • Will young voters stay active in elections post-Trump? - Los Angeles ... ›
  • The 2020 election shows Gen Z's voting power for years to come ›
  • The 2020 Election Was a Breakthrough Moment For Young Voters ›
young voters

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

Reform in 2023: Leadership worth celebrating

Layla Zaidane

Two technology balancing acts

Dave Anderson

Reform in 2023: It’s time for the civil rights community to embrace independent voters

Jeremy Gruber

Congress’ fix to presidential votes lights the way for broader election reform

Kevin Johnson

Democrats and Republicans want the status quo, but we need to move Forward

Christine Todd Whitman

Reform in 2023: Building a beacon of hope in Boston

Henry Santana
Jerren Chang
latest News

Your Take: Religious beliefs

Our Staff
03 February

Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Rabbi Charles Savenor
03 February

Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Our Staff
03 February

Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Lawrence Goldstone
02 February

Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Katherine Kapustka
02 February

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Our Staff
02 February
Videos

Video: The dignity index

Our Staff

Video: The Supreme Court and originalism

Our Staff

Video: How the baby boom changed American politics

Our Staff

Video: What the speakership election tells us about the 118th Congress webinar

Our Staff

Video: We need more bipartisan commitment to democracy: Pennsylvania governor

Our Staff

Video: Meet the citizen activists championing primary reform

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Our Staff
03 February

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Our Staff
02 February

Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Our Staff
01 February

Podcast: Separating news from noise

Our Staff
30 January
Recommended
Your Take: Religious beliefs

Your Take: Religious beliefs

Your Take
Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Civic Ed
Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Podcasts
Video: The dignity index

Video: The dignity index

Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Big Picture
Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Big Picture