As the Florida College System opens the fall 2014 semester on Aug. 18, Implementation Teams across the system have plans in place for the launch of TurboVote. Twenty-seven of the 28 colleges in the FCS are participating in TurboVote, a non-artisan, non-profit digital platform that makes voter registration – and voting – easy for students. The system is especially helpful to incoming freshmen with no previous voting experience and little if any knowledge of or interest in civic affairs as they enter college for the first time.
Implementation Teams identified at each college are employing a variety of strategies for making students aware of the TurboVote opportunity. These include embedding a link into the online registration process, sending emails to all students, staffing sign-up tables at Welcome Back receptions that typically greet students at the start of a new semester, engaging Student Government Association officers to spread the word, and recruiting faculty members to encourage students to go to the TurboVote link and register.
Participation in TurboVote is being offered free to participating members of the Florida College System. When TurboVote offered FCS a 50 percent discount on the $1,000 per college up-front fee to cover TurboVote’s services, the Institute for Strategic Policy Solutions at St. Petersburg College offered to cover the fees for the entire system for the first year. The additional charge of $1.17 per student registrant, which covers cost of postage to mail absentee ballots, was picked up by TurboVote’s foundation sponsors..
Watch this space for updates after the fall rush winds down, and click here to read more about it.
- Read related blog: “FCS is TurboVote’s First System-Wide Partner”
David Klement, Executive Director
Institute for Strategic Policy Solutions