Inspiring Civic Participation through Competition
University of Florida earned a big win over Tennessee in the voting booth
Colleges and universities in the U.S. often have long-standing rivalries that compel their students to win homecoming games, raise the most funds for a given cause, and encourage healthy competition. The century-old football rivalry between the University of Florida and the University of Tennessee has now become the basis for their newest student body competition: Getting the most students ready to vote with TurboVote. Powered by a strong implementation strategy, UF came out on top.
The University of Florida used several tactics to get campus staff and leadership involved in the competition, including spreading the word about it to their athletics department, the Panhellenic Council and Faculty Union, and other campus student organizations. They used QR and referral codes in print and online campaigns, recorded voter registration messages from head basketball and volleyball coaches that were played at games, and set up voter registration tables across campus. UF’s President recorded a video encouraging all faculty, staff, and students to register to vote internally, and UF also put together a video for their TurboVote site to help inspire users to vote.
“Our competition was driven around reminders, and we were excited to get over 2,000 reminder enrollments,” Teresa Cornaccione, Civic Engagement Coordinator & Lecturer at UF, shared. They also have a polling location on campus, and can easily direct students to cast their votes there.
Teresa advises other schools seeking to hold a similar TurboVote signup competition to team up with on-campus groups, organizations, and departments. “Our partners at the Panhellenic Council facilitated a competition among sororities to get the most election reminder enrollments. Since TurboVote allows us to create and share referral codes, it was easy for us to make a fun internal competition among student organizations.” One sorority tallied more than 1,000 TurboVote signups in one night!
UF’s ADPi sorority registering voters with their unique TurboVote referral code
Andrew Taramykin, a student TurboVote implementer at UF, noted that a Gators Vote Cabinet is being developed with a coalition of campus groups, students, and staff to have as big an impact as possible in future years. Because UF’s student body includes so many out-of-state students, they’re particularly excited about their work with the Out of Stater Gator group, and helping to make the voting process simpler for these students with TurboVote.
In 2023, Teresa, Andrew, and the rest of the UF implementation team look to offer robust information to their TurboVote users about local elections throughout the country, make voting habitual, and ease some of the tension that makes people avoid civic participation. Competition, either within their campus, or with other schools across the country, will continue to be part of their strategy, as well.
