How the tri-institutional group informs voters ahead of the 2024 presidential election
Presidential election season has arrived, and Auraria Votes, a non-partisan committee encouraging campus civic engagement, is gearing up to do just that.
“It’s just important to be engaged,” said MSU Denver student and Auraria Votes member Lara Widger. “As we’re continuing into this increasingly polarized United States that we’re living in, we just want more students to get involved before graduating.”
Widger, along with three other MSU Denver students — Madison Larsen, Melissa Aguilar and Teddy Espinosa — collaborate on the voting initiative program, where they organize panels, host competitions, coordinate campus events and more.
MSU Denver Undergraduate Studies received grant funding for the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years for the Voter Engagement Student Ambassador project that supports the work of the Auraria Votes tri-institutional committee.
“This is kind of, I guess, my introduction into voting,” Espinosa said. He voted for the first time on March 5 in the presidential primary election.
“I come from a community where, you know, politics are either very outspoken or very unspoken,” Espinosa said.
The first-time voter is from Roggen, Colorado, approximately 50 miles northeast of Denver. Roggen is part of Weld County, which has approximately 9.89% inactive voters out of 24,8558 total voters as of March 12. In comparison, Denver County, which includes the Auraria Campus, has approximately 16.48% inactive voters out of 536,212 total voters as of March 13. Inactive voters are voters who are registered but have not participated in recent elections or have not updated their registration.
Maintaining nonpartisanship does not always come easily for the student ambassadors.
“I honestly have to bite my tongue. Because I think when it comes to politics, you won’t really ever be able to change someone’s perspective.” Aguilar said. “Every time we go up to someone, the first thing that we say is that we are nonpartisan, we won’t tell you who to vote for, but we’ll educate you and teach you how to vote.”
Widger, a political science major, said, “I am partisan. And I do have a side… but when I’m clocked in, I’m not telling people to vote that way because I understand that’s not partisan.”
Auraria Votes’ commitment to non-partisan engagement earned MSU Denver recognition in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election.
The university was designated as a “gold campus” for voting rates by the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, a national rewards program that recognizes campuses across the country that aim to increase student voter rates. MSU Denver received this award due to the 70-79% voting rate turnout for the 2020 election. The overall national student voting rate in 2020 was 66%, according to a Tufts University report.
MSU Denver also was recently awarded the Highly Established Action Plan Seal of recognition by the ALL IN Challenge for developing efficient action plans to increase voter engagement.
“A 70% to 79% voting rate turnout is huge,” MSU Denver Associate Vice-President for Undergraduate Studies and Auraria Votes faculty advisor Elizabeth Parmelee said.
“It’s not just about voting… we want people who can vote to vote, but we also don’t want our large population of students who can’t vote to (think), ‘Oh, that’s not for me.’ There are still things you can do even if you can’t vote,” Parmelee said.
Aguilar said students who cannot vote can still make an impact in voter engagement — students can participate by offering to drop off a friend’s ballot and getting involved with initiatives like Auraria Votes. “It doesn’t necessarily always have to be a yes or no or a checkbox.”
How to get involved
- Volunteer with Auraria Votes by contacting [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected]. Paid positions may be available and posted on Workday in Fall 2024.
- Stay informed and keep track of upcoming election dates.
Keep up-to-date with Auraria Votes events on the group’s Instagram — @auraria_votes.
Isabel Guzman
Isabel is The Metropolitan's Managing Editor since 2023, reporter since 2022, covering local politics, environment, people and university news. She has been published in Denverite, MSU Denver's RED and the Emerald Magazine. She is available for tips and comments at [email protected].
