A Nonpartisan Initiative Empowers College Students to Go ALL IN as Voters and Engaged Citizens

Sometimes, the numbers really do speak for themselves. ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, an ambitious program to increase young voter turnout and civic engagement, has reached more than nine million students at over 960 colleges and universities in all fifty states and Washington, DC.

Launched in 2016 by Civic Nation, a nonpartisan, nonprofit ecosystem for high-impact organizing and education initiatives, ALL IN partners with colleges and universities that share the core belief that higher education should play a role in developing an active citizenry, and that voting is only the first step young people can take toward a lifetime of civic engagement. Through coordinated programming with school partners, ALL IN also promotes volunteerism, advocacy, and organizing as key ways to take part in democracy.  

“Whatever issues students care about are embedded in policy decision-making at all levels,” says Jennifer Domagal-Goldman, executive director of ALL IN. “Everything they’re studying, including social justice, science, education, health care, and more, connects to our broader society and democracy. We want them to realize they need to vote in everything and show up to school board and city hall meetings, write to elected officials, and more—they need to see all of it as interconnected.”  

Getting out the vote on campus is not a new phenomenon, but ALL IN’s approach is uniquely designed to meet the challenges of educating today’s students about their full civic rights. 

Instead of working directly with student activists, who often graduate by the time the next election rolls around, the initiative coordinates with faculty and staff at colleges and universities to build long-lasting capacity and opportunities for student participation, both as voters and in other ways. ALL IN has created Communities of Practice, a program that engages a wide network of higher-ed professionals who are dedicated to student civic engagement. ALL IN fellows, faculty, and staff from participating institutions can connect around challenges facing students, share resources, and support one another’s efforts.  

“Our Community of Practice institutions are leading the way in nonpartisan programming and research. Through these communities they are able to share ideas, brainstorm campus strategies, and develop partnerships to deepen nonpartisan democratic engagement on their campuses,” says Stephanie King, senior director of strategic initiatives at ALL IN. “Their work is setting the standard for what is possible in this space and, in turn, helps us develop best practices we can deploy across our network of nearly one thousand ALL IN campuses nationwide.” 

The first Community of Practice cohort includes forty-five historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Support from Mellon and other foundations has helped the ALL IN team to further establish cohorts of community colleges and Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs).  

“ALL IN focuses our Community of Practice program on HBCUs, HSIs, and community colleges because these institutions are historically rooted in traditions inclusive of active participation in community and democracy,” says Domagal-Goldman. “But many of these campuses are concentrated in states that are actively disenfranchising voters through strict voter ID laws and other means. These voter suppression tactics disproportionately impact  Black, Brown, and young voters, making the work to register and educate college student voters both more important and more difficult.” 

One in five Americans now identify as Hispanic, according to the Pew Research Center, and Hispanic student enrollment at US colleges and universities has increased almost 300 percent since 2000.  

Maria Alejandro is the program director of the Office of Civic & Community-Engaged Leadership at the University of Texas at San Antonio, a public, four-year HSI with over 34,000 students. 

“The student population at HSIs is emerging from a historically disenfranchised group who have experienced barriers to access to higher education in many cases,” says Alejandro, who along with program specialist Noelani Cubillos-Sanchez also serves as an ALL IN fellow for the HSI Community of Practice cohort. “HSIs are uniquely positioned to build the civic capacity of historically underrepresented students who bring valuable knowledge in their lived experiences.” 

Under their leadership—and with robust support from faculty, students, campus, and community partners—the student voting rate at the University of Texas at San Antonio grew by 17 percentage points from 2016 to 2020. “The more students get involved, the more they enhance their learning, strengthen social networks, and lead the university into working with the community,” Alejandro says. “It is through these experiences they can make connections on how policy intersects with their disciplines, concerns, and hopes for the future they will contribute to building. The students take the lead, and we are there to support them in their nonpartisan activities that keep them engaged and involved in the democratic process.” 

Similarly, Clark Atlanta is a private, four-year HBCU in Atlanta, Georgia, with a student population of four thousand. Clark Atlanta’s ALL IN team has helped to steadily increase the number of Clark Atlanta students who successfully register to vote and show up to the polls from 44 percent in 2016 to 65 percent in 2020. As Georgia continues to make national headlines as a swing state, work continues in a turbulent and changing climate. In 2021, Georgia passed a series of voting laws that affected absentee ballots, identification requirements, early voting, and vote counting—all issues that disproportionately affect young Black voters. The US Department of Justice is now suing on the basis of racial discrimination.  

More than a third of all American college students are enrolled at a community college, yet these institutions receive comparatively less funding from state legislatures than larger public universities, which severely limits any additional funding for student programming beyond basic academic instruction and services. At the same time, community colleges have a higher percentage of first-generation students, Pell Grant recipients, and students with work and family commitments away from campus—all student demographics that historically have been less civically engaged.  

This context has created a significant need for outside support for initiatives specifically tailored for community colleges. 

“Integrating [community college] students into the American electorate during their formative years will not only strengthen democracy but can conceivably persist throughout adulthood and expand to additional contributions within their own communities,” says Will Bowlin, one of two ALL IN fellows for the Community College Community of Practice cohort and a government and history instructor at Northeast Mississippi Community College (NMCC).  

NMCC is a public, two-year college in Booneville, Mississippi, with additional satellite campuses in nearby communities. Mississippi was recently named one of the most difficult states in which to vote by the Election Law Journal, and in 2016, only 31 percent of the three thousand students eligible to vote at Northeast Mississippi did so. But thanks in part to efforts led by Bowlin, that number rose to 54 percent in 2020.  

Similarly, Cochise College, a public, two-year college in southern Arizona, is set in a complex state voting environment. The ALL IN team at Cochise College has helped its student population of roughly 10,800 hold onto a steady voter turnout rate since 2016. This is a notable achievement since the county has been at the epicenter of recent election misinformation campaigns in Arizona to sow voter mistrust in voting machines and other standard election procedures. Research has found a link between voter mistrust and disengagement, and Cochise College’s ALL IN representatives have worked hard to help students overcome this uniquely challenging local barrier.   

From examples like these, ALL IN’s Domagal-Goldman and King say they hope to inspire other Communities of Practice partners, as well as the broader network of ALL IN partner institutes.  

And the team is just getting started. Now, ALL IN is actively compiling data on student voting rates during the 2022 midterms and working with partner institutions to develop student engagement plans for the 2024 presidential election.