The Campus Election Engagement Project (CEEP) works to help America’s colleges and universities get as many of their 20 million students as possible to register, volunteer in campaigns, educate themselves on issues and candidates, and show up at the polls. Our non-partisan engagement project had a major impact in 2008 and 2012 and is now addressing major off-year elections, beginning this year with Virginia’s state-wide elections. We’re currently recruiting a Virginia Outreach Director, to work with CEEP’s founder, Soul of a Citizen author Paul Loeb, and Senior Consultant Jonathan Romm to help engage Virginia schools, while being based in either Virginia or DC.
CEEP Summary: Founded in 2008, CEEP works through academic networks that schools know and trust to compile and distribute the most effective practices to get their students involved in elections. Our outreach staffers then follow up by phone to coach the schools in implementing them. In 2008, CEEP engaged over 500 college campuses that enrolled nearly 3 million undergraduates. In 2012, we worked with over 750 campuses in 26 states, enrolling over 5.5 million students. According to follow-up surveys, 74% of the schools CEEP approached used at least some of our resources or ideas, and 49% used many of them. Our project has a huge multiplier effect because we work with administrators, faculty, and staff whose salaries are covered by their schools, and help them collaborate to engage their students. CEEP focuses on students both because they historically vote at lower rates than other groups—particularly in non-presidential elections, where four out of five tend to stay home—and because when they do participate, their habits of involvement can last a lifetime. See www.campuselect.org
Job Summary: Your role with the project will be to reach out to college and university administrators, faculty and staff, and selected student leaders, building on the significant momentum we’ve already created with colleges and universities in the state, with nonpartisan groups like the League of Women Voters, and with some new partnerships with county registrars. You’ll be coached, mentored, and trained by CEEP’s national staff, focusing on how to help those you contact engage their schools using CEEP-created resource lists of effective nonpartisan ways campuses can help involve their students. You’ll build on these resources and relationships to help the state’s colleges and universities implement powerful engagement approaches like:
- Distributing templates for how schools can help students meet recent Voter ID requirements;
- Working to get schools registering new students at first-year orientation, using the Uvote model pioneered by Northwestern University and piloted in Virginia by Shenandoah University;
- Helping local county registrars and groups like the League advise new courses that we’re developing around election engagement;
- Working with IT and athletic departments to broadcast voter registration and election information links via QR codes on the Jumbotron at football games;
- Getting schools to link to Rock the Vote’s registration tool in online event ticketing and course registration systems and to promote electoral engagement through social media;
- Collaborating with campus newspaper advisors to help student newspapers distribute nonpartisan voter guides and give serious coverage to local and statewide races;
- For residential campuses, encouraging “dorm storms,” where Residence Life works with Student Activities and Campus Safety to temporarily relax normal security rules so student groups can register students door to door in the dorms;
- Helping evaluate proposals for mini-grants and student stipends to spur creative campus initiatives.
Required Skill-set:
- Ability to understand CEEP’s approach, to convey its power and vision, and to sum up concisely why schools should get involved with our project;
- Ability to set aside individual political beliefs and be meticulously nonpartisan while working with college and university administrators and staff, and with student leaders, including those of partisan groups like the campus Young Republicans and Young Democrats;
- Motivated and organized self-starter with top-notch written and oral communication skills, and comfort with involving the schools via email, telephone, and possible site visits. Your ability to brainstorm with them on their engagement approaches is critical;
- Ability to work with the relatively traditionalist culture of Virginia’s schools, which may take more convincing than those in other states;
- Thoughtful enough to get into serious conversations with the people you approach on ways they can engage their campuses, and to not be intimidated by their academic status;
- Major league persistence—will need to avoid being dispirited when key people don’t respond at any given school, and to be agile enough to pursue other leads and channels until you find the necessary allies;
- Knowledge of higher education a plus—you’ll be working with college and university deans, vice presidents, community service directors, and key faculty members, as well as student leaders;
- Passion for social justice, service, and civic engagement.
Benefits:
- $20-an-hour pay, full-time work;
- Work from your own home or apartment—in coordination with CEEP national staff;
- Support from our skilled national team. Loeb and Romm will provide coaching, role playing, letters and resource materials to send out, lists of existing contacts, and templates for phone conversations;
- Help our project make a major national difference.
If you are interested in joining the CEEP team, please email Jonathan Romm (staff@campuselect.org) with your resume and cover letter. Thanks for your interest in this opportunity. Only applicants short-listed for an interview will be contacted. CEEP is an Equal Opportunity Employer.