What happens when you bring 100+ of the country’s most promising high school civic leaders together in one place?
New Voters 250 is our year-long fellowship that equips 100 exceptional high school students to run two voter registration drives, lead a community organizing project, and develop a network of peers and mentors to become lifelong civic leaders.
This June, New Voters 250 Fellows traveled from more than 30 states to the University of Maryland Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement for four days of organizing, learning, and community-building. They arrived having already led voter registration drives and begun tackling issues in their own communities. They left with new skills, mentors, collaborators, and a national network of peers who showed them just how much young people can accomplish.
The New Voters 250 Fellowship was designed around a simple idea: young people become stronger leaders when we invest in them, and when they have the opportunity to learn from one another. Read on to see all they did!
Fatumata Barrie, Shon Khisti, and Eli Kalberer gave presentations with their voter registration tips and tricks. Check out Fatumata’s hook featuring the New York Knicks that got the entire room’s attention.
“The magic is in the work, and that magic showed up in my voter registration drive… and that’s how I ended up registering 190 of my classmates in one day”
- Fatumata Barrie
For Fellows, voter registration is the starting point. The experience of organizing their classmates, and seeing that their own leadership can produce measurable change, becomes the foundation for tackling other issues in their communities and lifelong civic leadership.
Throughout the year, each New Voters 250 Fellow leads a community organizing project addressing a local issue in their community, ranging from healthcare access to media literacy. On day two of the summit, fellows presented their project progress to date in a poster session! When student’s weren’t presenting their own projects, they admired their peers’ work and asked important questions that would inspire them in managing their own community organizing projects. Check out a few posters from fellows below!
Sometimes, seeing someone your age succeed in engaging their community can show you what’s possible. The poster presentations encouraged fellows to think about the possibilities that come with investing time and energy in their projects and in themselves.
At the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Center, New Voters 250 Fellows Sophia Gutierrez and Deola Aderemi took the stage alongside established leaders in public policy to discuss the future of youth civic engagement. New Voters partnered with When We All Vote to host a dialogue between adults established in fields related to public policy featuring Sophia and Deola, moderated by Russella L. Davis-Rogers, Managing Director at When We All Vote and joined Scott Warren, co-founder of Generation Citizen, and Daniel Werfel, the former commissioner of the IRS, to discuss youth civic engagement.
“Learning from different people and different arguments is necessary to develop your own” - Deola Aderemi
“Our country, its people and humans in general have endured it all by learning on each other, checking in, and building community.”- Sophia Gutierrez
Dr. Vivek Murthy, the 19th and 21st Surgeon General of the United States, got philosophical in his fireside chat with New Voters 250 fellows. He spoke about his own journey in understanding the balance between depth and breadth in his work. At a time when we’re told more enthusiastically than ever that success lies in scope and having your name plastered in as many places as possible, it was a refreshing take on what it means to do meaningful public service.
When addressing the ongoing loneliness crisis among adolescents, Dr. Vivek Murthy said, “Only the trees with the deepest roots will survive the coming hurricane,” encouraging an audience of young changemakers to ground themselves in their communities. He noted that community is necessary to prepare for the uncertainty of our rapidly changing world.
Not long after arriving at the University of Maryland, fellows heard from our opening speaker, Angela Duckworth, author and University of Pennsylvania professor. Angela discussed themes from her books, Grit, a #1 New York Times bestseller that has sold more than 5 million copies worldwide, and Situated, which is scheduled to release this September. In honor of Situated, Angela walked fellows through a point-tallying game to determine how situated they were.
It’s safe to say many people in the room felt called out when Angela asked, “How many of you work with your phone in view?” She reminded us that you can change your environment, from your bedroom to your social circle, to set yourself up for success.
There is a lot of anxiety among young people interested in careers in public policy. The morning of the last day of the summit, Brooke Lierman, the Comptroller of the State of Maryland, joined our Social and Digital Lead, Claire Pan in conversation about paths to careers and student involvement in public service. When asked about her activities as a student, she referenced her involvement in her school newspaper and how the experience changed her view of journalism.
Comptroller Lierman also showed how her journey changed and how a medical condition prevented her from joining the Peace Corps, where she thought she’d end up, but led to her current role as Comptroller. Her story, and Claire’s expert facilitation of the conversation, conveyed the message that while the future may not be certain, it is bright.
Fellows also had the privilege of hearing from Erica Perry, co-founder of the Black Nashville Assembly and Southern Movement Committee. Erica spoke about building power through grassroots organizing. Several fellows had the opportunity to ask important questions about engaging marginalized communities in democracy and finding a balance between impact and safety.
Erica also spoke about the consequences of gerrymandering and how redistricting in her home state diluted the Black vote. She closed by urging fellows to focus on meaningful work in their communities when organizing service projects.
There’s something pretty special about a room full of people who came prepared to ask good questions. It was such a treat for our 100 fellows to hear from leaders across public service and other pro-social careers. Photographed below are three of the 13 speakers students met with, from left to right: PA Organizer and Movement Voter Project Program Officer, Nirav Sanghani; NPR News Politics Reporter, Elena Moore; former Senior Advisor in the White House Office of Public Engagement, Hannah Bristol.
Fellows rotated in small groups for 15-minute speed networking sessions, matched with 4 of the 13 speakers based on their professional interests, to ask questions about their paths and careers. Thank you to all our speed networking speakers: Nina Harris, Nirav Sanghani, Billy Binion, Elena Moore, Madeline Doering, Hannah Bristol, Kevin Ryle, Morgan Rhoden, Melonie Tharpe, Sterling Speirn, Dr. Noreen Gentry, Yael Bromberg, and Dr. Zabina Basin.
Throughout the summit, we revisited what success looks like. It was a privilege for fellows to learn from a diverse group of changemakers in public policy and civic engagement.
🤖 The Rithm Project Workshop: A thought-provoking workshop hosted by The Rithm Project about the future of AI’s role in human connection, featuring an interactive card game to determine what role AI should and should not play in human relationships.
📻 Telling your story: In collaboration with KQED, the primary NPR member station for the Bay Area, New Voters hosted a “Telling Your Story” workshop where fellows created short audio pieces that shared stories about voting, civic action, and formative experiences. If you want to listen to fellows’ inspiring stories firsthand, check out the Youth Media Challenge Showcase.
📝 Optimizing your Voter Registration Drive: New Voters Program Manager, Ari Franco led fellows through a guided reflection on the successes and limitations of their respective voter registration drives.
👥 Basebuilding to Win: Fellows learned key tenets of organizing and how outreach can turn a good initiative into a great one from youth organizer and Executive Director of Feminist Generation, Rosie Couture.
We don’t just talk youth civic engagement every second of every day… definitely not every second. Check out some photos from our D.C. Day, where we visited the National Mall, the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, the National Archives, and the Library of Congress.
The Summit lasted four days. What Fellows do with those four days is just beginning.
They returned home with new organizing strategies, relationships spanning the country, and a community of young leaders they can continue learning from long after leaving Maryland. They returned to schools where they have the opportunity to bring hundreds of their peers into civic life. They returned to continue the New Voters 250 Fellowship for the rest of the year, meeting monthly with national leaders and one another, completing their community organizing projects, and leading another round of voter registration drives.
That is the larger bet behind New Voters 250: when we invest deeply in exceptional young people, their impact does not stop with them.
One Fellow can register hundreds of classmates. They can build a team around a local issue. They can inspire another student to see themselves as a leader. And, with the right mentorship and community, their first high school voter registration drive can become the beginning of a lifetime of civic leadership.
We are building New Voters 250 so thousands more young people can have that beginning.
The New Voters 250 Summit would not have been possible without the many people who invested in our Fellows. A huge thank you to our funders, partners, speakers, mentors, and New Voters team who made four days of learning and community-building possible. A special thank you to our nine counselors, including alumni of New Voters programs, who each led a unit of Fellows throughout the Summit and helped turn a group of students from across the country into a community.
We are especially grateful to the University of Maryland Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement for helping make the Summit possible and welcoming our Fellows to campus. New Voters Founder and President Jahnavi Rao is proud to serve as a Senior Fellow at CDCE.
Most importantly, thank you to our Fellows for bringing their ideas, energy, and commitment to creating change in their communities.
High School Students: Sign up to run a drive at your school
Not a high school student? Refer a high school student you know to run a registration drive and/or donate to support our continued work.
Are you a New Voters Alumni? Prepare yourself for the job market by checking out Generation Job Sprint, a 3-week program run by Generation USA to empower young people to pursue careers in Healthcare, Sales, Technology, and Green Jobs and Skilled Trades!
Check your voter registration status, register to vote, and more with New Voters’ official Voter Toolkit.
Sincerely,
Jahnavi and the New Voters Team
Did you like what you saw today? Pledge a future subscription to mobilize the youth! New Voters is a 501(c)3 dedicated to helping high school student leaders make positive change through civic engagement.
No posts
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.