1. Giving Back to the Community: African American Inner City Teens and Civic Engagement
Principal Investigator: Michelle Charles, Charles Communications Consulting

2. "Civic Views of Young Adult Minorities: Exploring the Influences of Kinship Communities and Youth Mentoring Communities on Prosocial Civic Behaviors"
Principal Investigator: Diann Cameron Kelly

3. "A Comparative Analysis of Community Youth Development
Strategies"
Principal Investigators: Michell Alberti Gambone, Hanh Cao Yu, Heather Lewis-Charp, Cynthia L Sipe, Johanna Lacose

4. "Gender and Civic Engagement: Secondary Analysis of Survey Data"
Principal Investigator: Krista Jenkins, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

5. "Mobilizing the Latino Youth Vote"
Principal Investigator: Melissa R. Michelson, California State University, Fresno

6. "Getting Out the Vote Among Asian Pacific American Young Adults in Los Angeles County: A Field Experiment"
Principal Investigator: Janelle Wong, University of Southern California

CIRCLE Working Paper 38: Giving Back to the Community: African American Inner City Teens and Civic Engagement

Project Summary
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Research by Michelle Charles explores how young inner city African American youth define civic engagement. The ethnographic study is based on interviews with African American teenagers age 15 to 19 living in North and West Philadelphia. Interviews were also conducted with "at risk" youth serving civic engagement organizations and other adults in the community. The author argues that the concept "giving back to community" is an important component of civic engagement that has not been formally recognized. Further, she offers recommendations for youth serving civic engagement professionals working with inner city African American teenagers.

CIRCLE Working Paper 25: Civic Views of Young Adult Minorities: Exploring the Influences of Kinship Communities and Youth Mentoring Communities on Prosocial Civic Behaviors

Project Summary
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New research by Diann Cameron Kelly documents how young minority adults interpret civic engagement. The study included 13 economically disadvantaged, high achieving young adults between the ages of 20 and 27 who had during their childhood participated in a group mentoring program. The participants were asked to keep a detailed online reflective journal on their civic experiences from adolescences to young adulthood. Analysis of the journals suggests that kinship communities (families and caregivers) and youth mentoring programs work together to promote sustained civic engagement. These groups provide the developmental opportunities young people need in order to participate in democracy as adults. When kinship communities fail to provide examples of civic and political participation, youth mentoring organizations can serve as an additional critical resource for helping young people meet the cognitive, affective, and behavioral benchmarks that seem to result in sustained civic engagement.

CIRCLE Working Paper 23: A Comparative Analysis of Community Youth Development Strategies
Michell Alberti Gambone, Hanh Cao Yu, Heather Lewis-Charp, Cynthia L Sipe, Johanna Lacose, Social Policy Research Associates

Project Summary
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Many youth organizations provide opportunities for older and diverse youth to be civically engaged. This research compares three types of programs: (1) youth organizing programs, (2) youth identity support programs, and (3) traditional youth programs. The research suggests that youth organizing programs are characterized by youth's experience of higher levels of youth leadership, decision making, and community involvement in comparison with other agencies in the study. In addition, the research suggests that deliberate approaches to staffing and decision-making structures can influence youth outcomes.

CIRCLE Working Paper 41: Gender and Civic Engagement: Secondary Analysis of Survey Data
Principal Investigator: Krista Jenkins, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Project Summary
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This research finds that there is no major “gender gap”
in civic engagement among today’s young people. According
to Dr. Krista Jenkins, the lead researcher, “Across most of the
options for participation in public life, the sexes are remarkably
similar in both what they choose to do and what they tend to
avoid. Although there are some interesting differences—such
as rates of voluntarism and political knowledge and attentiveness—
gender does not appear to be playing a significant role in
shaping civic engagement among youth.”

The research finds that generally women do not enter adulthood
with tendencies that make them any less likely to be engaged
citizens than men. However, there are some small differences in
the development of precursors to civic engagement. For example,
women are less aware of news and public affairs than their
male counterparts and also know less about politics, government
and the political process. On the other hand, young women
lead the way in volunteering and are significantly more likely to
believe that it is their responsibility, rather than their choice, to
get involved to make things better for society.

CIRCLE Working Paper 10: Mobilizing the Latino Youth Vote
Melissa R. Michelson, California State University, Fresno

Project Summary
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Over the past twenty years, the Latino population has doubled
and now constitutes the largest minority group in the United
States. Moreover, this population is young, with a median age of
26, and represents a potential bloc of voters who could shape policy
for many years to come. So far, unlike immigrant groups in
the past, this rapidly expanding group has not realized its own
voting power.1 According to “CIRCLE Working Paper 10: Mobilizing
the Latino Youth Vote” by Dr. Melissa Michelson of California State
University, Fresno, one powerful way to address the problem of
low Latino voter turnout is to “return to old-fashioned personal
canvassing efforts.” In particular, the paper presents evidence that
Latino youth (ages 18-25) are more likely to vote if asked to do
so face-to-face.

FINDING WHAT WORKS: THE MESSAGE OR THE MESSENGER?

In the fall of 2002, Michelson conducted a randomized field experiment in Fresno, CA to increase voter turnout among young
Latinos. The purpose of the experiment was to determine if the effectiveness of canvassing varies among registered voters of different races and ethnicities. Is canvassing equally effective in getting both registered Latinos and registered voters of other ethnic and racial backgrounds to cast a ballot? In addition, the experiment tried to determine if (1) the race/ethnicity of the canvasser
and/or (2) the message delivered by the canvasser had any effect on the number of voters mobilized.

The experiment involved sending forty matched pairs of canvassers
(either two Latinos or two non-Latinos) door-to-door during
the final two weekends before the gubernatorial election to
urge registered young people to vote. Each voter was randomly
assigned to receive one of two messages. They were either given
a message stressing civic duty or one that stressed community
solidarity.

LATINO ACTIVISTS SUCCESSFULLY MOBILIZE LATINO VOTERS

Michelson found that going door-to-door and asking registered
voters to vote on Election Day indeed led to increased turnout
among young Latinos. In addition, the study revealed that Latinos
were more likely to vote if contacted by another Latino than if
contacted by someone of another ethnicity.

Latino canvassers were also more effective in getting potential
voters, especially Latino voters, to open their door to listen to the
canvassers’ message. This could be due to a number of reasons.
Michelson states, “It is possible that Latino residents were more
likely to open their door if approached by other Latinos or it could
be that the Latino canvassers were more comfortable in these
neighborhoods and thus had more effective strategies for making
contact with potential voters.”

Finally, the study revealed that the content of the mobilization
message appears to not have an effect on turnout. Those who
received the civic duty message were no more or less likely to
vote than those receiving the community solidarity message.
Michelson’s findings indicate that the fundamental key to increasing
Latino turnout lies in increasing the face-to-face contact with
Latino voter activists. She concludes, “Turnout rates for young
Latinos [are] likely to remain low unless dramatic changes are
made to get-out-the-vote efforts. In order to increase Latino
turnout, more Latinos need to have face-to-face contact with a
voter mobilization activist. In order to have a real impact on the
young Latino vote, these efforts must be made by Latino activists.”

CIRCLE Working Paper 19: Getting Out the Vote Among Asian Pacific American Young Adults in Los Angeles County: A Field Experiment
Principal Investigator: Janelle Wong, University of Southern California

Project Summary
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This study examines the effects of mobilization on political participation among Asian Americans. It focuses on whether telephone and mail canvassing increases voter turnout among Asian Americans who live in high-density Asian American areas in Los Angeles County. Prior to the November 5, 2002 elections, a randomized voter mobilization field experiment was conducted. Lists of registered Asian Americans (Chinese, Korean, Indian, Filipino, and Japanese) were randomly assigned to treatment and control groups. A few days before Election Day, the treatment group received a phone call or postcard encouraging them to vote. After the election, voter turnout records were reviewed to compare turnout rates for the treatment and control groups. The results of the study show that telephone calls and mail canvassing increased voter turnout for Chinese Americans and that the effects of contact vary greatly by ethnicity and geographic context.