Celebrating Student Vote Champions on Campuses

This week, the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge (ALL IN) celebrated and recognized colleges and universities, as well as students, faculty and staff, presidents and chancellors, coaches, partner organizations and election officials for their nonpartisan efforts to engage students in the 2022 midterm elections. These stakeholders helped ensure that college students across the country registered to vote and cast informed ballots despite nationwide efforts to undermine democracy through restrictive voting laws.

ALL IN believes in developing an inclusive democracy. We envision a country where the electorate reflects the makeup of our country and university students participate in our democracy on an ongoing basis, during and between elections, not just at the polls. The nearly 1,000 campuses participating in the ALL IN program are leading the way, helping us achieve these goals and make this vision a reality. Together, they nurture generations of engaged and informed citizens who are essential to a healthy and prosperous democracy.

Fifteen awards were announced during the virtual celebration on November 14, including distinguished faculty members, campus administrators, students and partners. Attendees were welcomed by Civic Nation CEO Kyle Lierman.

During the celebration, ALL IN recognized a set of individual campus stakeholders:

• Chancellor Carrie Dixon of Elizabeth City State University (NC), a Historically Black University, and President Michael McDonough of Raritan Valley Community College (NJ) were recognized with President & Chancellor Standout Awards.
• Standout Faculty Awards were presented Jamie Lennahan, Associate Professor of Political Science, at Germanna Community College (VA) and Sanne Rijkhoff, Assistant Professor of Political Science, at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.
• Melissa Baker-BoosamraAssociate Director of Student Life, from Grand Valley State University (MI) and Tedd VanadilokDirector of the Center for Student Involvement, Santa Clara University (CA), awarded Standout Administrator.

Two non-partisan student voting groups Huskers Vote Coalition at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln and DU Votes at Denison University (OH) were also recognized for their contributions to nonpartisan student involvement. Two partner organizations, Engage Miami and VoteRiderswere recognized with outstanding local and national partner awards, respectively.

ALL IN strives to reach all parts of a campus, developing partnerships and recognition opportunities for those who lead nonpartisan voter participation in athletics. Outstanding Coach awards were presented Kenny Blakeney, head men’s basketball coach, Howard University (DC) and Daniela Tomichead volleyball coach, Bowling Green State University (OH);

ALL IN campuses work with election officials to promote student voting efforts. ALL IN acknowledged Eric Fay and Rick Strem by the St. Louis County Board of Elections for their bipartisan efforts with the Outstanding Local Election Official Awards.

Lieutenant Governor of New Jersey and Secretary of State Tahesha Way was also recognized with ALL IN’s Standout Secretary of State award. ALL IN works closely with nine bipartisan secretaries of state to help their offices support and recognize nonpartisan student voting efforts, including California, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington, as well as and nonprofit organizations in states and cities across the country.

The ALL IN celebration is a moment to recognize the hard work of developing and empowering young voters. One of the ALL IN speakers, Kei Kawashima-Ginsberg, CIRCLE’s Newhouse Director, summarized the work that still lies ahead to make our democracy truly representative. “Give young people access to civic opportunities, support them so they can take advantage of those opportunities, and build a culture that makes those opportunities meaningful and fun. And we must do it together. There is work to be done for all communities and institutions in the work of growing constituencies. Higher education can play a huge role and we know many of you already do.” ALL IN looks forward to continuing to support participating campuses on their journey to foster cultures of engagement that do just that.

You can find the full list of individual recipients of our champion awards here; The full list of campuses receiving Seals of Recognition will be announced once the National Study of Learning, Voting and Engagement reports from Tufts University’s Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life are released.

The ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge congratulates all of our campuses for participating in our democracy. To learn more about ALL IN or how your campus can get involved, visit allinchallenge.org.