Washington,
DC —Today, two of the nation’s leading higher education associations—the
American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU) and the Student
Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (NASPA)— announced a partnership with
TurboVote. Through this partnership, TurboVote, a nonprofit, nonpartisan
organization, will bring its innovative “one-stop-shop” voter engagement
platform to students at college and university campuses across the country.
Made
possible by a grant from the Rita Allen Foundation, this partnership will
support AASCU and NASPA member institutions in their on-campus voter outreach
efforts, help them promote civic learning and foster habits that will lead to
life-long civic engagement.
"TurboVote’s
platform represents an important and innovative piece of the effort to increase
civic literacy and engagement through digital technology,” said Elizabeth Good
Christopherson, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Rita Allen
Foundation. “In partnering with NASPA and AASCU, TurboVote will vastly increase
access to a key voting demographic while making significant improvements in
voter engagement efforts at colleges and universities across the country.”
TurboVote’s
platform helps colleges and universities meet federal mandates that require
institutions provide students with voter registration information. With help
from NASPA and AASCU, TurboVote hopes to support institutions in meeting these
mandates and set a new standard for voter engagement in higher education.
“This
partnership sends an important message to institutional leaders that democratic
engagement should be a part of every student’s college education,” said George
Mehaffy, AASCU’s Vice President for Academic Leadership and Change.
NASPA
and AASCU’s access to key players in higher education will help TurboVote
integrate its platform into established systems and student interactions. TurboVote’s
tool makes it possible to conduct voter engagement without collecting or
submitting a single form. Simply by sharing a link, schools can embed voter
engagement into existing processes such as freshman orientation and class
registration.
“NASPA
members have a unique opportunity to promote democratic engagement across the
many channels of the co-curriculum," says NASPA President Kevin Kruger.
"We are excited to add TurboVote to the tools used to educate students for
citizenship both inside and outside the classroom.”
With
help from AASCU and NASPA, TurboVote — already working with over 80 campuses
across the country—will expand its reach to at least 100 new colleges and
universities this year, with the hope that this effort will yield an additional
110,000 new users each year, starting in 2014.
12
institutions have already signed on to launch the service under the AASCU/NASPA
partnership.
###
AASCU is a Washington-based higher
education association of nearly 420 public colleges, universities and systems
whose members share a learning- and teaching-centered culture, a historic
commitment to underserved student populations and a dedication to research and
creativity that advances their regions’ economic progress and cultural
development.
NASPA is the leading association for
the advancement, health, and sustainability of the student affairs profession.
Our work provides high-quality professional development, advocacy, and research
for 14,000 members in all 50 states, 25 countries, and 8 U.S. territories.
TurboVote is a project of Democracy
Works, a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization based in Brooklyn, N.Y.,
that is passionate about building the democracy of the future. TurboVote is a
service that makes voting easy. When students sign up, TurboVote keeps track of
all their elections—local, state and national. If students wish to register,
update their addresses or request absentee ballots, TurboVote sends them all
the forms and information they need with pre-addressed, pre-stamped envelopes.
For every election, TurboVote sends text message and email reminders to all
users with important election information, dates and deadlines, to ensure that
they never miss another election.
Campus Media Contacts
Alvernia
University: Joseph J. Cicala, (601) 796-8211, joe.cicala@alvernia.edu
Arizona
State University: William Valencia, (480) 466-8106, William.Valencia@asu.edu
Chatham University:
Dana Brown, (412) 365-2725,
dbrown@chatham.edu
Florida State College
at Jacksonville: Jill Johnson, (904) 632-5016, jill.johnson@fscj.edu
Illinois State
University: Noha Shawki, (309) 438-3861, nsshawk@ilstu.edu
Missouri State
University: Michael Stout, (417) 836-5357, MStout@missouristate.edu
Northeastern
Illinois University: Dana Navarro, (773) 442-4227, d-navarro@neiu.edu
Stanford
University: Colleen Coffey, (650)
725-2865, ccoffey7@stanford.edu
Texas A&M
University-Central Texas: Morgan Lewing, (254) 519-5713, morgan.lewing@ct.tamus.edu
The
College at Brockport: State University of New York: Karen Podsiadly,
(585) 395-2211, kpodsiad@brockport.edu
University of
Nebraska-Lincoln: Linda Major, (402) 472-3755, Lmajor1@unl.edu
University of
Nebraska-Kearney: Joseph Oravecz, (308) 865-8528,
oraveczja@unk.edu