Student Voting at Michigan Technological University

Given that our society operates as a democracy, it is of utmost importance for every member to vote. It is each citizens’ civic duty after all. Based on that principle, I would expect to see numbers supporting the claim that more people vote than those who do not. After looking into the voting rates published by the NSLVE, I was shocked to see that more people are not voting than those who do. The National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement(NSLVE) is an organization that collects data on each college campus regarding its voting participation. Here on my college campus, the rate of students who vote is significantly less than the national average for all institutions. Based on data from 2016, the average voting rate among all institutions was 50.4%; on the campus of Michigan Technological University, around 34.3% are voting. Even more shocking was that the registration rate was 62.3%, meaning that only half of the people who register to vote end up going through with the process. If students went through the effort to register to vote, what has prevented them from voting? How has the voting participation at my University dropped so far below the national average? Why are students less likely to vote here compared to other campuses? Questions such as these keep arising in my head whilst reading the NSLVE report, and now I am forced to look into plausible answers before the insanity of uncertainty consumes me. 

Further down in the NSLVE report, it shows data regarding methods used to vote, among voters, and the voting turnout broken down by age group. These may be hints to helping me answer bigger questions such as why and how voting, here at MTU, is significantly less than the national average. There was a polarity within the methods used to submit votes; here students either submitted an absentee vote, or they voted in person on election day. There were practically no students who mailed in or opted for an early vote. Why might that be? Well, after doing some further research I have found an article talking about the difficulty students may face when voting. “Election officials in some states have made it difficult for a young voter to cast a ballot. Particularly, student voters in New Hampshire, Texas, Florida, and Michigan have been subject to oppressive policies leading up to the general election”(Ayala, 2018). In mention of Michigan, Ayala mentions a court case filed by the University of Michigan in 2018. The case threw out an old law in Michigan which required first time voters to vote in person. This law was not widely known, and many of those who registered did not know until it was too late. This law may be a huge contributor to why only half of the students who registered to vote ended up doing so.  

Further breaking down the voting turnout by the age of voters that participated, it appears that between the age range of 18 to 30 years old, less than 30% of eligible voters had submitted votes. Only after the age of 30 did the voter turnout increase. Based on this, it would be fair to assume that younger individuals are less likely to vote than those who are over 30. So then, what is contributing to younger people not voting? I have one hypothesis based on my own experience here at MTU; due to the heavy workload that exists here compared to other universities, students are less likely to vote when they feel they have “better” things to do such as homework or studying. To further look into the time demand placed on students at MTU, I looked at the university expectations of students. The following quote was found on the university website: “For an undergraduate course the expectation is approximately two hours of work outside of class for each lecture or recitation credit.” If you have two or three lectures a day, that would equate to 4-6 hours per day on top of hours spent in the lecture. Given that an average work day is 8 hours, students are being expected to work 8-9 hours a day. Quite a busy day indeed; if you add onto that meetings, labs, and other extracurricular activities there is virtually no time left for free time. With students having such a busy schedule it is fairly expected that students will only do things they prioritize, and voting is just not high enough on their priority list. 

Citations:

 Institute for Democracy & Higher Education: National Study of Learning, Voting and Engagement. (2016). 2012 & 2016 NSLVE Campus Report. Medford, MA. 

“3.2.5 Class Times.” Michigan Technological University, Dec. 2016, www.mtu.edu/faculty-handbook/faculty/chapter3/s3-2/325/.

Ayala, Rebecca. “Voting Problems 2018.” Brennan Center for Justice, 5 Nov. 2018, www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/voting-problems-2018.