A student registers to vote at National Voter Registration Day last fall. UMW students vote at a rate of more than 50 percent. (Matthew Binamira Sanders ’20)
Mary Washington students are motivated and informed – and they vote.
Their civic responsibility earned UMW the 2019 ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge Platinum Seal for institutions with a student voter participation rate above 50 percent.
Mary Washington is well above that mark. In the 2016 presidential election, 67 percent of UMW students voted, compared with a 61 percent rate nationwide. In the 2018 midterms, 53 percent of Mary Washington students voted, exceeding the national student voter turnout of 39 percent.
Besides voting, Mary Washington students have shown their civic engagement by hosting debates with state legislature candidates, holding voter registration drives on campus, and providing rides to the polls.
Center for Community Engagement Associate Director Sarah Dewees and several students accepted the award at a November 2019 ceremony in Washington, D.C.
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