How do you motivate students to vote? See how the Dallas County Community College District and the League of Women Voters of Texas worked together to create a voter education series for secondary and higher ed. instructors to teach high school and college-level students about the importance of voting.
The Challenge
In the Fall of 2016, The League of Women Voters (LWV) contacted the Dallas County Community College District’s LeCroy Center to ask for help in developing an educational project to engage non-voting students in the electoral process. The voter turnout statics presented by the League were shocking. Only half of eligible voters in Texas turnout for elections, ranking near the bottom compared to other states with similar demographics. Turnout statewide is especially low among young people ages 18 to 24, hovering between 10 to 25 percent.
The LWV has documented evidence that voter education, including instruction on how to vote and explanation of why it is so important, improves turnout among young people. While the League has had great success in registering students to vote by going classroom to classroom, they needed help creating quality voter education materials that would be available and easily distributed to high schools and colleges throughout Texas, so that teachers and faculty could use these materials to better prepare young people to become responsible voters.
Designing the Project
Our first step in designing the project was to create a framework for the content. Analyzing the LMV’s research, we decided to concentrate on the reasons young people said they didn’t vote. These included:
- Didn’t know anything about the candidate or issues.
- Didn’t understand the process.
- Didn’t know where or when to go vote.
- Didn’t know there was an election.
- Didn’t think their votes mattered.
Using this information as a basis, we collaborated closely with the LMV and our instructional designers to develop a six-module structure that became the backbone of the project. The six modules are titled:
- Why Should I Vote?
- Does My Vote Matter?
- How Do I Register to Vote?
- What Am I Voting For?
- Where Do I Find Information?
- When and Where Do I Vote?
The project is called Be a Texas Voter. Fortunately, the domain name was available, so we setup a website to house the OER lesson material at beatexasvoter.org
Using the Modules (NOTE: All of the following will be demonstrated in Module 1)
The six modules were prepared in compliance with the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) social studies requirements and the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) Texas Core Curriculum. The lesson materialsare designed to assist instructors in teaching high school, dual credit, and college level students. Although the OER website was created primarily for secondary and college instructors, the materials are freely available to teachers at any level and to any organization or individual involved in educating the public about the importance of voting.
The purpose of the OER website is to provide instructors with easy access to curated materials they can use in either online courses or face-to-face classrooms. The design of the modules encourages flexible use of the content. Modules, or portions of modules, can be used in any sequence as standalone instruction or integrated into existing Social Sciences and Government curriculums. The html webpages can be copied in part or in their entirety and then pasted into word processing or text editing applications, learning management systems or other websites that instructors use to develop lessons. Instructors are encouraged to select and edit the materials to meet the needs of their students in terms of skills, maturity and abilities.
Overview
http://beatexasvoter.org/why-vote-overview/
The first section of the overview lists alignments between the module and the Texas Core Curriculum. Also included is a brief summary of the content, the “Essential Question,” learning objectives for the module, a list of materials and links to reading assignments. A range of ability levels is included so instructors can select material that is appropriate for their students. Some assignments also include review questions that instructors may want to assign and collect for a grade.
Activities
http://beatexasvoter.org/why-vote-content/
The instructional sequence for all modules begins with a Hook Activity. This activity introduces content and helps students connect to prior knowledge as they prepare to learn new material. Overall, the activity is not designed to be a formal, graded assessment, but it can be used as an informal measure of class participation.
[Participants respond by show of hands to the 5 true/false questions about voter participation in Texas.]
The next step in the sequence is for students to view the video. The DCCCD’s LeCroy Center has a 40-year history of producing educational media. We produced a video for each module designed to answer the “Essential Question” asked in the Overview. Since these videos have to appeal to a young audience, they were designed to be fast-paced, witty, fun and short (less than 5 minutes). There is also a bullet-point outline of the topics covered in the video.
[Show “Why Should I Vote?” video]
The follow up discussions are designed to reinforce the “Essential Question” posed in the video. Instructors are free to choose from one or more of the discussion topics.
[Show Discussion Activity: “Instructor leads group study and discussion of voter turnout in the 2016 election using charts at United States Census Bureau”.]
The Reading Assignments are provided in the format of either a series of bulleted study questions [Show Module 1] or Talk/Read/Talk/Write [Show Module 2]. This approach is intended to deepen students’ understanding of the content and minimize the need for instructor lectures.
The research and discussion assignments that follow the reading component cover a wide range of topics and abilities. Instructors can choose the options that are appropriate for their students and can modify the assessments to ensure student success.
Also included in this Module 1 are two surveys that can be distributed to students. The results can be tabulated and shared with the class.
Resources
http://beatexasvoter.org/why-vote-resources/
Additional links to instructional and supplemental materials are provided in this section. If used effectively, these resources can help instructors guide students in furthering their knowledge and developing a deeper understanding of concepts presented in each module.
Evaluating the Project
The project was piloted in Spring 2018 by DCCCD faculty for effectiveness and academic alignment. Among the comments we received were:
- “I love the diversity of resources here [Module 1 Resources] and how they look at voting on different scales: national, state, and county.
- [Re: an activity in Module 2] “This is phenomenal. I cannot wait to use this in the classroom.”
- “I am loving the buffet of options. I think teachers love to pick and choose and have an ability to make it their own with lots of aggregated resources.”
- “It features great videos, activities and resources and all online. On top of all that the series has been developed according to TEA and THECB rules.”
Evaluation forms are provided to the professors, teachers and students in the classrooms where the videos and supplemental materials are presented. LWV volunteers tabulate the results. Based on results, if needed, the lesson materials may be modified.
Marketing the Project
The League of Women Voters is promoting the Be a Texas Voterproject in a variety of settings.
Hands on Activity
Participants will experience the content first-hand through a facilitated, hands-on activity taken from the curriculum.