Wake Forest honored with gold seal, receives two ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge awards
In a school year like no other, college students encountered numerous challenges. While living through a global pandemic and learning in a virtual environment, the vast majority of Wake Forest students were also faced with the opportunity to participate in their first presidential election. In a year where it would have been easy to pass on their civic duty, students instead rose to the occasion, and those efforts were recently recognized by the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge during its third biennial awards ceremony.
On Monday, November 8th, the campus community learned it had been awarded a gold seal by organizers of the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, a national nonpartisan initiative of Civic Nation. There are five seal levels, and WFU was one of 195 that received the second-highest recognition, celebrating campuses with voter participation of 70%-79% or higher in the 2020 Presidential Election. In 2020, 78.2% of eligible WFU students voted, surpassing the national rate of 66%.
“It’s an honor for Wake Forest to be recognized by ALL IN for its efforts to improve voter turnout on campus,” said Marianne Magjuka, Ed.D., Assistant Dean of Students and Executive Director of the Office of Civic & Community Engagement. “Through Deacs Decide, our campus community came together and worked diligently to not only register students to vote, but educate them on the importance of their vote. It’s great to not only see that reflected in the data, but for it to be recognized by ALL IN.”
After seeing a 29.9% voter turnout increase from 2016 — when just 48.3% of eligible WFU students cast their ballots — WFU was also recognized at the state level, earning the Most Improved Voter Turnout Award during the North Carolina Campus Voting Challenge Award Ceremony.
Wake Forest was one of 19 schools from the state of North Carolina to participate in the statewide voting challenge. Currently, 19 states participate in the ALL IN State Voting Challenges, encompassing more than 426 institutions enrolling 4.3 million students.
In addition to the campus-wide honors, Athletics was also recognized for successfully rallying Demon Deacons student-athletes to register and vote, earning the DemocrACCy Most Improved Voter Turnout award – given to the ACC school with the largest increase in voter engagement.
This is the first year that ALL IN is honoring the work of their Athletic Conference Voting Challenges, in which schools compete against their athletic rivals to increase nonpartisan student voter participation and engagement. There are currently 12 athletic conferences participating in the ALL IN Athletic Conference Challenges, encompassing 125 institutions enrolling 2.6 million students.
The 2020 presidential election engaged the largest and most diverse group of college students in U.S. history, according to the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE), a research study of the Institute for Democracy in Higher Education (IDHE) at the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts University. NSLVE reported that 66% of college students voted in the 2020 elections, a 14 point increase from 2016.
About the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge
The ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge (ALL IN) is a national, nonpartisan initiative of Civic Nation, a 501(c)(3) organization. ALL IN strives for a more inclusive democracy—one in which all voices are heard. We believe that higher education plays a role in graduating students into voters and in closing electoral participation gaps that persist by race and age. Through an intentionally designed program—which provides structure, support, and recognition—ALL IN strengthens college and university efforts to improve civic learning, political engagement, and voter participation. Ensuring that students are registered to vote and participate in all elections is a key component of our work.