With election day now days away, ACE member University of Michigan is making it easy—and enjoyable—for students to cast their ballots.
The university’s nonpartisan
Creative Campus Voting Project (CCVP) uses art and design to demystify and dynamize the voting process. The centerpiece of CCVP’s efforts is a pair of welcoming spaces on campus known as voting hubs. The hubs are satellite offices of the Ann Arbor city clerk, and UMich students can visit them to register to vote, request and submit an absentee ballot, vote early, and learn more about voting in any state.
CCVP partnered with state and local election officials to create a version of Michigan’s voter registration form exclusively for the voting hubs. The modified form uses clear language, explains how to record a dorm address, and features similar typefaces and colors to those used throughout the voting hubs.
Hannah Smotrich, co-lead of CCVP and an associate professor at the University of Michigan Stamps School of Art and Design, said in an interview the voting hubs are designed to ensure positive voting experiences.
“From the moment a student enters the voting space, we think about what information they need, and at which point, in that process,”
she said. “And instead of experiencing a fairly dry, bureaucratic space, like they might at city hall, they enter this light-filled, glass-enclosed gallery, which is a beautiful, wonderful place to be.”
This is the third election in a row with voting hubs at UMich, and they seem to be making a difference. Fifty-three percent of students
voted in 2022, compared with 47 percent in 2018, and 78 percent of students
voted in 2020, up from 60 percent in 2016.
The Higher Education Act obligates institutions to help students register to vote. An
issue brief ACE released earlier this year outlines ways institutions can fulfill this obligation and facilitate student voting.
Prominent displays within the hubs address common areas of confusion to reduce anxiety for students, many of whom have never voted before. Each hub contains a giant reproduction of Michigan’s ballot with plain-language explanations of the various offices and topics like judicial elections and ballot initiatives. Students can also pick up copies of colorful, cheerfully illustrated zines with titles like “Voting 101,” “Voting out of State?”, “I’m Registered, Now What?”, and “Know Your Ballot.”
Students make their own voting-themed buttons at the Central Campus Voting Hub
Students with additional questions can ask city clerks on site for help, or they can consult peer mentors who are trained to give nonpartisan guidance on registration and voting.
“I have had other voters say, ‘Why don’t all polling places look like that?’” Ann Arbor City Clerk Jackie Beaudry told
The Michigan Daily, UMich’s student newspaper.
The voting hubs are designed to make voting exciting and engaging. A mural made of thousands of multicolored “I vote” buttons adorns each hub and is intended as a backdrop for photos after students vote. Nearby are stations where students can gather to make their own buttons and celebrate having voted. Students are also invited to place a pin on a large felt map of the country to mark where they are voting.
“Our hope is that what people take away from this experience is feeling that it was very welcoming, clear, smooth, and anchored in their lives,” Stephanie Rowden, co-lead of CCVP and an associate professor at the university’s Stamps School of Art and Design, told
The Michigan Daily. “They won’t remember the particulars, but they don’t need to. Instead, they need to take away this positive feeling as it will be the beginning to a much longer relationship with being a voter.”
Photos courtesy of Lindsay Farb and Stephanie Rowden