The student movement to get out the vote is paying off for Lake Michigan College. They’ve earned national designation as a “Voter Friendly Campus,” after creating their first ever LMC Votes! campaign in 2018.
Last year on Constitution Day, Lake Michigan College formulated plans to help educate the student population and encourage their active role in the voting process. By November,a team of Political Science students, employees and volunteers had collected 1,500 pledges to vote and helped 107 students from all LMC campuses to get registered to vote for the first time in their lives.
Now, the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators and Campus Vote Project have designated Lake Michigan College as a “Voter Friendly Campus.”
LMC joins 15 colleges and universities in the state of Michigan, and 123 in the United States who have earned the designation for promoting democratic engagement efforts for students on campus.
Tiffany Bohm is the Political Science Professor who spearheaded the campaign and introduced a special topics election course at the college last fall. She responded to the new designation saying, “Being viewed as a Voter Friendly Campus is a reflection of what students learn in our classrooms and how it applies to their everyday lives,” and adds, “Not only did students in the Campaigns and Elections class learn about civic engagement, they helped their friends and family get involved in the democratic process.”
The LMC Votes! team distributed postcards, made signs and held raffles. They gave away free copies of the U.S. Constitution and held a panel on voting rights.
Congressman Fred Upton and candidates Dr. Matt Longjohn and Joey Andrews visited students at the Benton Harbor campus. LMC hosted the League of Women Voters Berrien Cass County and the American Association of University Women (AAUW) to promote Registration Day.
They helped absentee voters mail their ballots securely, and on Election Day, provided shuttles from the Benton Harbor campus to various polling locations. On Election Night, students, employees and volunteers representing all parties gathered to watch live polling results together.
The Voter Friendly Campus designation is part of the civic mission of higher education to prepare students to be engaged participants in our democracy. The designated Voter Friendly Campuses represent a wide range of two-year, four-year, public, private, rural, and urban campuses. Designations are valid through December 2020. You can learn more online at www.voterfriendlycampus.org.
NASPA is the leading association for the advancement, health, and sustainability of the student affairs profession. Their work provides high-quality professional development, advocacy, and research for 15,000 members in all 50 states, 25 countries, and 8 U.S. territories.
The Fair Elections Center is a national, nonpartisan election reform organization working to remove barriers to registration and voting for traditionally underrepresented constituencies and improve election administration. Fair Elections Center’s Campus Vote Project works with universities, community colleges, faculty, students and election officials to reduce barriers to student voting and helps campuses institutionalize reforms that empower students with the information they need to register and vote.
In the photo accompanying this story on Moody on the Market, as provided by LMC, are LMC students, from left, Daniel Acker and Keith McCall, showing off their LMC Votes! shirts with LMC Votes! coordinator and political science instructor Tiffany Bohm.
