Election Engagement

As a part of our mission to support student civic engagement, we partner with the national nonpartisan Campus Election Engagement Project (CEEP). This collaboration promotes efforts to engage students in federal, state, and local elections by providing electoral information and resources to faculty, staff, and students at colleges and universities across Iowa & Minnesota.

We work with member campuses to support efforts to create institution-wide efforts and plans to engage campus and community in elections and voter education that increase student civic agency and voter turnout.

Ways to Engage

Campuses interested in increasing their voter education and engagement efforts can:

Campus Fellows

Iowa & Minnesota Campus Compact partner with CEEP to provide $1,000 grants to campuses to support a student election engagement fellow. Fellows receive a stipend to support their work as well as educational resources on electoral engagement from CEEP. Read more about the program here.

We are seeking campuses ready to engage fellows in activities that advance the ten evidence-based recommendations outlined in “Election Imperatives” of the Tufts’ Tisch College Institute for Democracy & Higher Education.

Activities might include:
– Engage students in local elections taking place this fall (as applicable)
– Support civic learning and dialogue activities that help develop informed voters and discussion of public issues, such as Constitution Day Dialogues and the 2020 Census
– Build campus capacity for student voter registration, education, and turnout in primaries, caucuses, and the fall 2020 election, including forming cross-campus, inclusive coalitions to improve the climate for civic participation

Eligibility:
Campuses seeking CEEP fellows need to have a willing supervisor who will
– recruit and select their CEEP fellow from among their own student body
– direct the fellow’s work, and
– ensure it is integrated into other election engagement efforts on campus.

Timing & Logistics: 

For Fall 2020, we expect to be able to fund several fellows across Minnesota and Iowa. If you are interested in hosting a fellow, please contact Emily Shields.

About CEEP

Campus Election Engagement Project (CEEP), is a national nonpartisan project that helps administrators, faculty, staff, and student leaders at America’s colleges and universities engage students in federal, state, and local elections. Drawing in stakeholders throughout our partner campuses, we combine our powerful resources with personalized coaching, guiding schools on how to use our resources and navigate students through ever-changing barriers to voting. Working with us, campuses help their students to register, volunteer in campaigns, educate themselves on candidates and issues, navigate confusing voting laws, and turn out at the polls. We worked with over 300 campuses in 2016, with a combined enrollment of 3.5 million students, while partner organizations distributed our resources to another 1,000 schools. We spent 2017 helping our campuses develop ongoing engagement strategies while getting students involved directly in Virginia’s statewide races and Alabama’s US Senate race. And we’re now engaging students in the 2018 elections. Because individuals who vote when they’re young tend to continue, and because we help schools deepen their electoral engagement each cycle, we generate both immediate and long-term impact.

For more information, visit their website at Campus Election Engagement Project or follow them on Twitter