An engaged citizenry is vital to the maintenance of a vibrant democracy. Yet the US is a global laggard in voting, well behind most advanced industrial democracies – especially when it comes to youth voters.

In 2024, only 48 per cent of 18- to 24-year-old citizens voted, well behind other age groups . In the 2022 midterms, the proportion was a mere 28 per cent. A 2020 study by the  found the US in the lowest quintile for youth voting among the 24 countries surveyed, ranking just ahead of Jamaica and Moldova and a whopping 40 percentage points below Sweden.

Perhaps even more than a voting problem, however, US youth have a voter registration problem: in 2024, only 58 per cent of 18- to 24-year-olds were registered, nearly 30 per cent fewer than older age groups.

The Trump administration and a number of states are compounding problems by making voting more difficult. States are passing laws that create new barriers for first-time voters to register and to vote, both in person and via absentee ballots. The laws are particularly damaging , many of whom are first-time voters living far from home. For example, several states have recently mandated photo identification to vote while simultaneously , disqualifying those issued by private – and in many cases state – institutions of higher education (IHEs).

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Meanwhile, in August, the Department of Education sent a guidance letter to higher education administrators prohibiting institutions from using – intended to provide employment for students with financial need – to pay students for non-partisan voter activities, including voter registration and get-out-the-vote efforts.

The letter also encouraged IHEs to issue stark and discouraging warnings to potential student registrants about the consequences of voting illegally or providing false information on complex issues such as residency.

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This puts IHEs in a difficult position – particularly because they are still required by the Higher Education Reauthorization Act of 1998 to make a “good faith effort” to provide voter registration materials to students. So what should they do?

Most importantly, as we argue in our new book, , they should explicitly support student voting as a core part of their educational and democratic missions. They should reject calls for “neutrality” that imply disengagement and passivity, and they should develop integrated plans to promote and defend student voting.

Such plans will vary according to institutional circumstances, but they should attempt to do the following. First, actively encourage voter registration – whether students vote from where they originate or in their new college community. This cannot be achieved by a one-off email. Rather, specific moments throughout students’ college careers, such as orientation or class registration, should be used to compel them to consider voting options and, importantly, to offer them help to navigate an otherwise opaque process.

Second, colleges should facilitate in-person voting. They should inform students of early voting hours and encourage election officials to situate polling places on campuses, both for early and election day voting. Failing that, they should provide transportation to off-campus polling places. Either way, they should have resources available during early voting and on election day to help students navigate inevitable challenges that emerge. And, where possible, they should adapt institutional identity cards to correspond to state voting rules, such as by including signatures and expiration dates.

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Students who vote absentee from their home states should also be supported. IHEs should inform them about state-specific due dates to apply for and return ballots, and provide mailing instructions, notifications and even stamps for a generation of youth unaccustomed to snail mail. They can help students overcome barriers, such as requirements by some states that absentee voters provide notarised or in-state witness signatures on their ballot envelopes.

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As well as the how of voting, IHEs also need to address the why. They should help students become aware of the roles and positions that are on the ballot, from town counsellor to state comptroller. They should gather and disseminate information on positions of the key candidates, particularly on issues relevant to students, and invite those candidates and/or their representatives to campus. They should also encourage courses, programmes and fellowships that engage with the voting process, elections and civic life more broadly.

Finally, IHEs should systematically assess student voter accessibility; monitor developments on the local, county and state level; and provide input, assistance, and advice to students who face voting challenges. They should also facilitate links with civil society organisations that defend voting rights and partner with organisations such as  and to develop institutional voting action plans and build internal infrastructures. And they should speak out institutionally when students face injustice.

Beyond voting, students can be encouraged to get involved voluntarily in the non-partisan registration and voting activities that the Trump administration is discouraging – or raise private funds to pay them.

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Specific faculty and staff can also be tasked with creating annual learning opportunities around voting and wider civic responsibilities and with supporting and advising students when they face challenges in registration or the voting process.

American IHEs have historically extolled the link between higher education and democracy. If institutions are to give this meaning then leaders need to invest resources – moral, financial, intellectual and organisational – to promote and defend the most foundational democratic right: voting.

In so doing, they will model democratic behaviour and help shape a future of engaged citizens.

is vice-president for academic affairs, professor of political studies and director of the Center for Civic Engagement at Bard College. is a constitutional rights and voting rights litigator who teaches democracy law at American University Washington College of Law. is Bard College’s dean of civic engagement. They all contributed to the book, (DeGruyter, 2026), edited by Becker and Bromberg.

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