CONWAY,
Ark. (September 30, 2019) – On-campus voting at Hendrix College increased by
more than 20% between 2014 and 2018, according to a report by The National
Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE). NSLVE is a project of the
Institute for Democracy & Higher Education at the Jonathan M. Tisch College
of Civic Life at Tufts University.
The
College’s overall voting rate is higher than the national average. Hendrix also
saw strong increases in voter registration and the voting rate of registered
students from 2014-2019.
“Student-led
voter registration outreach has been consistently strong, and student ownership
of that process is a point of pride at Hendrix,” said. Hendrix politics
professor Dr. Jay Barth ’87. “This certainly underscores the importance of
having an on-campus voting site. Campus voting sites are crucially important to
making voter participation easier for students.”
Support
for campus voting sites is a clear indication of an institution’s commitment to
civic engagement, Barth added.
Hendrix
has been a precinct since 2004 and, since 2016, has been a voting center for
students, faculty, staff, and Faulkner County residents.
According
to the NSLVE’s national report Democracy
Counts 2018: Increased Student and Institutional Engagement, college students across
the United States more than doubled their rate of voting between the 2014 and
2018 midterm elections, and 40% of students who are eligible to vote cast
ballots last year, up from 19% in 2014. The significant increases from 2014 to
2018 cut across many categories, from age to student demographics to fields of
study.
In
addition to hosting a voting center, Hendrix is a member institution of Project Pericles, the national civic
engagement initiative, and participates in a political polling project with Talk Business & Politics. Hendrix also hosts the
Arkansas Policy Program, an undergraduate think tank where students conduct
research and provide nonpartisan, original analyses of key public policy issues
in the state.
Watch
Barth and fellow Hendrix alumnus Peter Butler ’17, then Hendrix Student Senate
president, discuss their work to expand access to student voting sites on
campus in this video.
About Hendrix College
A
private liberal arts college in Conway, Arkansas, Hendrix College consistently
earns recognition as one of the country’s leading liberal arts institutions,
and is featured in Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will
Change the Way You Think About Colleges. Its academic quality and rigor, innovation, and
value have established Hendrix as a fixture in numerous college guides, lists,
and rankings. Founded in 1876, Hendrix has been affiliated with the United
Methodist Church since 1884. To learn more, visit www.hendrix.edu.