Las Vegas – While young Americans with college experience continue to be more likely to vote than those who don’t attend college, there are effective strategies and initiatives to help bridge this gap, according to new research released by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Netroots Nation in Las Vegas this week.

• Fact Sheet (suggested citation: Nover, A., Godsay, S., Kirby, E.H. & Kawashima-Ginsberg, K (2010) Electoral Engagement and College Experience, CIRCLE Fact Sheet, from www.civicyouth.org)
• Press Release

Many more young Americans are going to college, but 22 million (nearly half) of 18 to 29 year olds are not enrolled in higher education programs. Since 2000, voter turnout among college-educated youth has increased by 12 percentage points and non-college youth turnout has increased by nine percentage points. In 2008 the turn out rate of college-educated 18 to 29 year-olds was 62 percent - 26 percentage points higher than the rate of non-college youth. Midterm turnout disparities are equally drastic: in 2006 there was a 17 percentage point gap between the two groups.

Youth voter turnout disparities are even higher when broken down further into four more specific categories. In 2008, 72 percent of those with a Bachelor’s degree or higher voted, which is 21 percentage points higher than the national average for young people. Fifty-seven percent of young people with some college experience voted. Among high school graduates, 39 percent went to the polls. Slightly more than a quarter of young people with less than a high school diploma voted in 2008.

Research shows there are strategies that may help to overcome these turnout disparities. In recent elections some states have implemented election reform laws, including Election Day registration, mail-in ballots, early voting, absentee voting laws and extended poll hours. In fact, in 2008 among 18- to 29-year-old citizens who are in the labor force, implementation of longer polling hours was associated with a seven percentage point increase in the voting rate for full-time (35 or more hours per week) workers and a five percentage point increase for part-time workers.

By Melissa S. Kovacs & Daniel M. Shea

July 2010

In a recent report entitled, Nastiness, Name-calling & Negativity: The Allegheny College Survey of Civility and Compromise in American Politics, the authors found that average citizens are upset about incivility, although they differ by ideology, gender, and media use. “CIRCLE Working Paper #71″  focuses on the newest generation of voters,  finding that they differ from their older counterparts, being less likely to believe that civility is possible, less ashamed about recent incivility, but more supportive of compromise and more optimistic about higher education’s role in promoting civility.  Findings suggest a nearly universal recognition of the problem and a growing concern about the implications of an uncivil body politic. Further, the findings cast blame at a number of institutions, but also give reasons for optimism.

*Download CIRCLE Working Paper #71 “Youth Attitudes toward Civility in Politics”

*Download the full original report here

Suggested Citation:  Kovacs, M., & Shea, D.  (2010). Youth Attitudes toward Civility in Politics (CIRCLE Working Paper No. 71). Retrieved from Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) website: http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/WorkingPapers/WP_71_Kovacs_Shea.pdf

By Hugh McIntosh, Sheldon Berman, and James Youniss

March 2010

“CIRCLE Working Paper #70” describes a five-year evaluation of a high school program designed to encourage schoolwide democratic deliberation.  The intervention involved, in part, organizing the school into clusters of 100 to 150 students that met for one hour each week to discuss governance and other school-related issues, perform community service, and pursue other cluster-related activities.  The researchers, Hugh McIntosh, Sheldon Berman, and James Youniss, found that over the five-year evaluation, the rate of participation in community service increased by 23 percentage points.  They attribute this increase to the clustering intervention, since 17% of all seniors (28 of 169) in 2007 reported that the only service they performed was in their cluster.  In addition, they note that the increase in community service participation spread widely throughout the student population, including males and females, Whites and non-Whites, high- and low-SES students, highly active students, and students who seldom get involved in non-academic school activities. The qualitative findings from this study support the idea that adult support plays an important role in building youth civic engagement.

*Download CIRCLE Working Paper #70 “A Five-Year Evaluation of a Comprehensive High School Civic Engagement Initiative”

Suggested Citation:  McIntosh, H., Berman, S., & Youniss, J. (2010). A Five Year Evaluation of a Comprehensive High School Civic Engagement Initiative (CIRCLE Working Paper No. 70). Retrieved from Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) website: http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/WorkingPapers/WP_70_McIntosh_Berman_Youniss.pdf

Turnout of Voters Under Age 30 is 19% in New Jersey, 17% in Virginia, and 12% in New York City
Interviews with Experts Available; Contact David Roscow at
703-276-2772 x14 or kathleen@tricomassociates.com

Tisch College, Medford/Somerville, Mass. -  Young voters played a major role in the 2008 presidential election, but less so in 2009.  In the New Jersey governor’s race, turnout decreased by seven points to 19% between 1997 and 2009.  In Virginia, turnout decreased by just one point to 17% between 1997 and 2009.  Less than one in five eligible young people voted in both states. A majority of young people preferred the Democratic candidate in New Jersey and the Republican candidate in Virginia.

To produce state-level youth voting estimates immediately following an election, CIRCLE relies on preliminary exit polls, which are subject to revision.   We must use 1997 for comparison because no turnout data are available for more recent off-year elections in these two states. Thus we do not know the change since 2005, the most recent gubernatorial election year in Virginia and New Jersey. Comparisons to the presidential election year of 2008 are misleading because turnout is always much lower in odd-numbered years.

Table 1: Turnout in Gubernatorial Elections, ages 18-29

As a proportion of all the people who voted, in 2009, under-30s represented 9% in New Jersey and 10% in Virginia. (“Turnout” is the proportion of all young citizens who voted, shown above.)

In Virginia, where Republican Robert F. McDonnell won the election by a large margin, young voters preferred McDonnell to Democrat R. Creigh Deeds by 54% to 44%. In New Jersey, young voters preferred Jon S. Corzine over Christopher J. Christie by 57% to 36%. In New York City, young voters preferred Michael R. Bloomberg to William C. Thompson Jr. by 49% to 48%. These results are according to exit polls conducted by Edison Research.

Data from the 2000, 2004, and 2008 presidential elections show that youth turnout in Virginia, New Jersey, and nationally had been steadily increasing in presidential years:

“Although 17 and 19 percent are low turnout numbers and far from satisfactory, they should be put in context,” said CIRCLE Director Peter Levine. “Turnout is always much lower in off-year gubernatorial elections than in presidential years. Also, it is a statistical mistake to generalize or make predictions based on a very small sample, such as two governors’ races. We do know, however, that gubernatorial campaigns and independent, nonpartisan groups put more resources into mobilizing youth in 2005 than they did in 2009. Other research shows that campaigning to young voters is effective at raising their turnout.”

As another way of estimating the turnout trends, CIRCLE analyzed the  number of votes cast in 13 precincts in VA and 5 precincts in NJ that have relatively high concentrations of college students.  These precincts were the focus of non-partisan get-out-the-vote efforts of the Student PIRGs’ New Voters Project in 2005. We compared the turnout rate of registered voters from the 2001 and 2005 Gubernatorial Election with Tuesday’s turnout of registered voters and found that the number of voters decreased by an average of seven percentage points (compared to 2001) in the precincts studied in VA (see Table 3) and increased by three percentage points (compared to 2001) in NJ (see Table 4). Again, it is important to note that the campaign and nonpartisan resources devoted to youth outreach were smaller in 2009 than in 2005. For instance, in New Jersey the PIRGs made 16,000 get-out-the-vote contacts in 2005 and 9,000 in 2009.  The PIRGs did not have a get-out-the-vote effort in VA in 2009.

*Download the Press Release

More information on youth voters and civic engagement can be found online at www.civicyouth.org.

* The estimated number of young people who voted in the 1997 VA and NJ Governor’s races were calculated using: (1) the number of ballots cast in each race according to the media, (2) the youth share of those who voted, as reported by CNN/Time Exit Poll, and (3) the estimated number of 18-29 year old citizens taken from the 1997 Census
Current Population Survey, March Demographic File.

CIRCLE (The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement) conducts and promotes research on the civic and political engagement of Americans between the ages of 15 and 25. A part of the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service at Tufts University, CIRCLE has received funding from The Pew Charitable Trusts, Carnegie Corporation of New York and several other foundations.

The Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, a national leader in civic engagement, prepares students from all fields of Tufts University to become engaged public citizens and community leaders.

Tufts University, located on three Massachusetts campuses in Boston, Medford/Somerville, and Grafton, and in Talloires, France, is recognized as one of the premier research universities in the United States. Tufts enjoys a global reputation for academic excellence and for the preparation of students as leaders in a wide range of professions. A growing number of innovative teaching and research initiatives span all Tufts campuses, and collaboration among the faculty and students in the undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs across the University’s schools is widely encouraged.

By Kim Castle, Janice Levy, and Michael Peshkin

October 2009

In CIRCLE working paper (#66), authors Kim Castle, Janice Levy and Michael Peshkin assess the outcomes of an in-person campus drive in which students were offered a choice of college-state voting in Illinois, or home-state voting by absentee ballot. The study found that the great majority of students who came from swing states chose to vote back home. Students from swing states preferred home-state voting over local voting by an 8-to-1 ratio. The study also found high turnout rates both for students who voted locally and by absentee ballot. 79% of students who registered locally voted, and 84% of students who got an absentee ballot voted. Although absentee voting is more complicated than local voting, most students chose absentee voting. The study concluded that:

•  Students can be diligent voters with high turnout, both by absentee ballot and in local voting.
• Students who can vote in their home state or their college state are strongly influenced in that choice by the closeness of the presidential election.
• Even in the internet era, in-person voter drives reach many students who would not otherwise vote.

*Download CIRCLE Working Paper #66 “Local and Absentee Voter Registration Drives on a College Campus”
*Download the Press Release

Suggested Citation:  Castle, K., Levy, J., & Peshkin, M. (2009). Local and Absentee Voter Registration Drives on a College Campus (CIRCLE Working Paper No. 66). Retrieved from Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) website: http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/WorkingPapers/WP_66_CastleLevyPeshkin.pdf

The National Conference on Citizenship has released its annual Civic Health Index report for 2009, entitled Civic Health in Hard Times (pdf). As in past years, CIRCLE contributed to the design and analysis of the national survey that was the basis of the study and helped with the writing of the report. In addition to the 40 measures of civic participation that compose the Civic Health Index, the survey included timely questions about such topics as the perceived impact of the recession on civic life.

The NCoC summarizes the main findings as follows: “As economic distress continues through the summer and into the fall, Americans are suffering from a ‘civic foreclosure’ that is limiting the range and depth of their civic engagement. The survey’s results reflect the hard choices Americans have made during the downturn, with 72 percent of respondents saying they have cut back on time engaged in civic participation, which includes time spent volunteering, participating in groups or performing other civic activities in their communities. Public perception supports this finding, as 66 percent of Americans say they feel other people are responding to the current economic downturn by looking out for themselves, with only 19 percent saying people around them are responding to the recession by helping each other more.”

Suggested citation: National Conference on Citizenship, Civic Enterprises, Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement & Saguaro Seminar (2009), America’s Civic Health Index: Civic Health in Hard Times. Washington, D.C.: National Conference on Citizenship.

Tisch College, Tufts University —Despite the upward trend in youth volunteering, young adults with no college experience are half as likely to volunteer as their collegiate counterparts, according to a new report examining the relationship between youth volunteering and college experience. Roughly 43 percent of the 20-to-29-year-old population has not attended college. Download the fact sheet (in PDF) here.

Conducted by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University’s Tisch College and released jointly with the National Conference on Citizenship, the report found that 25 percent of young adults who have attended college volunteered in 2007 while only 11 percent of those with no college experience volunteered. This gap has remained constant since 2002.

Peter Levine, director of CIRCLE, said young people without college experience are underutilized and underestimated: “Studies show all young people want to get involved in their communities, and lack of college experience should not be the deciding factor,” Levine said. “Schools, communities and government need to create more opportunities for all young people, not just the ones with a college education. Volunteering and participation in civic life is an important part of society, and no one should be excluded from an opportunity to do so.”

The report found that young people who used new media tools such as email, social networking sites (Facebook, MySpace) and text messaging were more likely to volunteer. College and non-college youth use new media at similar rates. However, online forms of civic engagement (such as commenting on a blog for civic purposes) are less common among young people without college experience. These findings should be interpreted with caution because more research is needed on this topic.

“Facebook, Twitter and other new media were successfully utilized in the 2008 election to promote voting and political involvement among young people,” said David B. Smith executive director of NCoC “With both college and non-college youth using social networking sites more and more, this technology may help to close the volunteer gap between these two.”

Using data from the Census Current Population Survey (CPS) and other research, the report also found disparities within specific gender, racial and ethnic demographics. Regardless of college experience, young women volunteer at higher rates than young men. Additionally, whites with some college experience volunteer the most among 20-to-29-year-olds, volunteering at a rate of 28.2 percent. African Americans and Latinos with no college experience were the least likely to volunteer, with volunteering rates at 7.2 percent and 6.8 percent, respectively. American youth who live in rural areas have slightly higher rates of volunteering than the 19 percent national average for youth.

Eight in 10 young volunteers became involved by approaching the organization or being asked to become involved. Youth with college experience were more likely to have started volunteering through a pre-existing connection with that organization (33 percent) compared with 21 percent of non-college youth. Of those who started volunteering in some other way, youth without college experience were more likely to have started volunteering through a relative than college youth.

When asked for which type of organization they volunteered, “religious” organizations were the top choice for young people regardless of college experience. Most spend their time mentoring youth and teaching/tutoring, although young people with college experience were slightly more likely to provide professional or management assistance including serving on a board or committee.

Levine said he hopes the findings of this report motivate people to reach out to younger generations and inspire interest in civic affairs. “Given this poor economic climate and the downward trend in youth civic engagement, it is important, now more than ever, to impress upon our young people active involvement in civic life.”

The press release is available here.

STATES HAVE THE POWER TO INCREASE YOUTH VOTER PARTICIPATION
Election day Registration most Effective in Boosting Youth Voter Turnout

Minneapolis, MN – With a record youth voter turnout in the 2008 election, allowing voters to register at the polls on Election Day was the most effective way to boost youth voter turnout according to a new report analyzing the impact of state election law reforms on young people in the 2008 election.

The report, conducted by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University’s Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, found young Americans in the nine states with Election Day registration laws (EDR) were 41 percent more likely to vote than those living in states without EDR after controlling for education, gender, age, race/ethnicity and marital status.  EDR also may decrease the disparity between young and older voter turnout. Before implementing EDR, Idaho, New Hampshire and Wyoming were amongst the worst states in terms of turnout inequality between young and older Americans. This gap has closed in all three states since EDR was implemented. The full fact sheet can be found here.

At the National Association of Secretaries of State summer meeting, CIRCLE Senior Researcher Emily Kirby said the results of the study prove states can do more to increase youth voter participation. “Young voters came out in record numbers in the 2008 election with 51 percent going to the polls, but the turnout ranged widely across states,” said Kirby. “Seven of the top ten states had the most ambitious voter turnout measures. It is crucial that states use this information to see which methods work best and tailor the legislation to the needs and characteristics of their younger constituents.”

While EDR showed the most results, the study also concluded keeping polls open for more than 12 hours on Election Day increased the youth voting rate by seven percentage points among full-time working youth and five percent points among part-time working youth.  Part-time students also benefited from extended voting hours, also receiving a five percentage points boost.

The study also found offering no-excuse absentee voting proved to be effective. In the 2008 election, 14 % of American youth voted by mail. In the states where No-Excuse Absentee Voting was an option, 23% of young people who voted did so via absentee ballot. Results also showed states requiring all registered citizens to be mailed information on polling locations produced higher youth turnout rates than states that did not require such action.

The report also produced a couple of unexpected results. The 30 states that required private firms to provide time-off or vacation time to employees to vote saw no significant link to an increase in youth turnout.  In addition young voters in 32 states that permitted no-excuse pre-Election Day in-person voting were not more likely to vote than others. However, 24 percent of 18- to 29-year-old voters from the states that allowed in-person early voting voted early and in person.

“The study serves as a guidebook for what works and what does not,” said Kirby. “It’s time for our state legislators to take action and implement laws that allow citizens from every stage of life to participate in our government to the fullest possible extent.”

The press release is available here.

Youth Voter Turnout Rate Rose to 51.1 Percent, Third Highest Rate Ever: 2 Million More Young People Voted Than in 2004

The fact sheet on youth voter turnout and trends in 2008 and a 50-state breakdown can be downloaded here (PDF). The press release is here.

Tisch College, Tufts University – Nearly two million more young Americans under the age of 30 voted in the 2008 presidential elections as compared to the 2004 elections, according to new Census data analyzed and released by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University’s Tisch College.

The increase is a continuation of the trend observed in the 2004 and 2006 elections. Youth turnout was 11 percentage points higher than in 1996, which was the low point after decades of decline. While young people increased their turnout significantly in 2008, older adults voted at lower rates than in 2004 and only slightly above their 2000 level.

Although overall youth turnout was high in the 2008 presidential election, there were important differences in turnout rates. Young African Americans posted the highest turnout rate ever observed for any racial or ethnic group of young Americans since 1972.

The gap in turnout by educational attainment remained large; voter turnout of young people without college experience was 36%, compared to a 62% rate among young people with college experience. (About half of the young adult population has some college experience.) There was also a significant gender gap in turnout: young women voted at a rate eight points above young men.

“We have now seen three consecutive presidential elections with substantial increases in youth turnout,” said CIRCLE Director Peter Levine. “We appear to have entered a new era of stronger youth engagement—also shown by high rates of volunteering and community service. But there are persistent gaps in engagement, with less advantaged youth still mostly left out. We must find ways to engage and expand civic opportunities for this cohort of young people.”

CIRCLE’s new fact sheet provides a 50-state breakdown of volunteering rates for teenagers, young adults, and the population over 25. Vermont, Utah & North Dakota show the highest rates; New York and Nevada among the lowest

The fact sheet as a PDF

The press release as a PDF

Tisch College, Tufts University. – Fewer high school age (16-18) Americans stepped up to volunteer their time over the past two years, new research reveals. Traditionally, teenagers have volunteered at slightly higher rates than other age groups, but in 2007 people 25 or older were more likely to volunteer than were those 16 to 18.

These are some of the findings from a study examining youth volunteering trends from 2002 to 2007 released by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University’s Tisch College. The research presents volunteer rates by state and age groups calculated using the Current Population Survey (CPS), a joint product of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau.

Overall trends showed a 6 percentage point decline in volunteering among 16-to-18 year-olds since the rate peaked in 2005 at 33 percent. Meanwhile, volunteer rates for the population aged 19-to-25 (18 percent) and 25 years and older (28 percent) both changed very little (2 percentage points or less) since 2002.

Volunteer rates were found to vary tremendously across states and age groups, and to change from year to year. The state rates for 16-to-18 year-olds ranged from a high of 48 percent to a low of 14 percent in 2007, while in 2002 the high was 52 percent and the low 16 percent. The states with highest and lowest rates also differed for this age group. In 2007 the highest were Oregon (48 percent), Vermont (47%), Alaska and Utah (44% each). The top states in 2002 were Montana (52%), Iowa (48%) and Maryland (47%). The states with the lowest rates in 2007 were Nevada (14%),;West Virginia (15%); and New Mexico and Kentucky (18%). In 2002, Mississippi and the District of Columbia (16% each) and Tennessee (17%) were the lowest.

The state rates for college-age adults (19-to-24 year-olds) were generally lower, and again with different states leading the pack and bringing up the rear in 2002 and 2007. In 2007 the highest rates were in Utah (30%), North Dakota (29%), Maine and Washington State (28% each) and the District of Columbia (27%). While in 2002, the top states were Utah (36%) and Missouri (34%). The states with the lowest rates in 2007 were New Jersey (8%), Tennessee and Delaware (9% each). The bottom in 2002 were Massachusetts (11%), and Nevada, Tennessee and Indiana (13% each).

For the 25 and older cohort, the state volunteer rates and those with the highest and lowest rates remained relatively unchanged from 2002 to 2007. Rates in 2007 ranged from a high of 43 percent in Utah to a low of 19 percent in Nevada, Florida, New York and New Jersey. In 2002, Utah again led the pack at 49 percent and New York, Florida and Nevada had the lowest rates at 22 percent.

The study also examined the state policies impacting youth volunteering, which many researchers believe have an impact on the levels of volunteering for 16-to-18 year-olds. A Corporation for National and Community Service study found the public schools that make community service available has grown from 64 percent in 1999 to 68 percent in 2008, but those that meet the criteria for “service-learning” has declined from 32 percent in 1999 to 24 percent. Furthermore only two states, Maryland and the District of Columbia, have made volunteering a mandatory requirement to graduate from high school. Eight other states (AR, CT, DE, IA, MN, OK, RI and WI) allow service-learning activities to be counted towards high school graduation credit.