Northeastern State University partners with TurboVote

Starting this fall, Northeastern State University Student Affairs offers multiple opportunities to keep students engaged and up-to-date in the political world.

NSU has partnered with Democracy Works, a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit and the creator of TurboVote, an app that makes voting quick, easy and hassle-free.

Seth Flaxman, co-founder and executive director of Democracy Works, missed several elections in college as a student, spawning the idea for the app.

When a student signs up with TurboVote, all relevant elections are kept track of on the local and national level. When an upcoming election nears, text and email reminders are sent out to the student. The app also serves as a one-stop shop for all things voting, including voter registration, requests for absentee ballots, and even paper copies of completed forms with stamped, addressed envelopes to a students local election officials.

During the Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (NASPA) annual conference, Helen Lahrman, Coordinator of Greek Life and Community Engagement for NSU-Tahlequah, and Chris Adney, Director of Student Activities, were formally introduced to staff members of TurboVote and were able to ask specific questions on how the product could be managed on NSUs campus.

The idea for the partnership between TurboVote and NSU came from the NASPA Lead Initiative on Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement that NSU is a part of, Lahrman said. Voter engagement is always a relevant topic on a college campus, and NSUs part in this lead initiative allows the university to align with the goals of TurboVote to help bring voter engagement to our students through a means that is relevant to them.

The Northeastern Student Government Association (NSGA) has taken much interest to help push the initiative. On Thursday, Sept. 11, NSGA set up tables where students were able to ask questions and gather information, and even sign up for TurboVote. The organization was able to use the event to gauge interest levels from the campus community on the importance of voting. A second opportunity for students took place on National Voter Registration Day, Sept. 23. Although results are not yet available, a nationwide competition took place on the Sept. 23 to see how many sign-ups institutions could get in one day.

With NSU being the first higher education institution in the state of Oklahoma to sign on to the NASPAs Lead Initiative, Lahrman hopes to set an example and be seen as a resource to other institutions in the state.

I think it is great that NSU is ahead of the curve on this topic and mobilizing these efforts for our students, faculty, and staff. We are passionate about providing an environment that develops the whole student and being engaged politically is definitely a key piece to the development of students, Lahrman said. I believe other colleges and universities will hear about TurboVote and look into how it can help their campus out and see that NSU already has it and has been utilizing it, so I hope that they call and reach out and we can help each other best accommodate our students.

TurboVote, which has been cited as the Netflix of voting by companies such as Mashable, started with one partner university in 2012, and to date has partnerships with more than 140 college and universities nationwide. The organization hopes to someday make registering to vote a default experience for all students.