The Arizona Student Vote Summit brought a day of voter education to Mesa Community College – Mesa Legend

The 2026 Arizona Student Vote Summit was held at Mesa Community College (MCC) on Sept. 25, bringing together college students and representatives from across the state to learn about how to increase voter participation amongst students.

Organized primarily by the Students Learn Students Vote (SLSV) Coalition, the largest nonpartisan network dedicated to raising college student voter registration in the U.S, the Summit was made up of several different organizations hosting their own workshops or putting up booths with a focus on voter education. 

“The focus of the Students Learn Students Vote is really just on helping students navigate the voting process,” said Clarissa Unger, co-founder and executive director of the SLSV Coalition, “We really focus on voter registration, voter education, voter turnout, and also ensuring that students have access to voting as well.” 

Among the different activities at the event was a workshop on “Planning Civic Celebrations: Making Democracy Fun” facilitated by the SLSV Coalition, as well as an Election Protection Training hosted by Common Cause Arizona. 

Not every organization that attended hosted a workshop, however, with some rather opting to spread information and put up tables which attendees could visit to learn more about the organization and what they do. Among these were organizations like All Voting is Local and Arizona Native Vote.

The different organizations stressed that registering to vote is just the start of the voting process, and it is through events like the Arizona Student Vote Summit that students can learn how to best navigate the voting process and be civically engaged within their community. 

The goal the SLSV Coalition has set is to reach 100% student voter participation. At first glance this might seem like a daunting task, but college student voting has been on the rise in recent years. According to data collected during the 2024 presidential election by Tufts University’s Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, 76% of college students were registered to vote and 53% of all eligible students voted.

This rise in voter participation is not consistent however, as voting rates during the midterms tend to fluctuate alongside with the ever-changing political environment, according to Danny Fersh, the communications director for the SLSV Coalition. 

“I would say, over the long haul trending upwards, hopefully one day towards 100%, but it ebbs and flows with different election cycles given the different conditions on the ground,” he said. 

This event is only a small part of a national push to increase voter education and participation for the upcoming elections. At the same time as the event in Arizona, the Coalition was also hosting another Student Vote Summit at Michigan State University. 

After the midterms, the SLSV Coalition will be back on Mesa Community College’s campus for the National Student Vote Summit from November 18 to November 20, 2026 for a debrief of the election and to see what can be learned from it. 

This will be the first time that the National Summit has been hosted in the Southwest, as the event is normally held along the East Coast. The SLSV praised MCC as a national leader in civic engagement and celebrating civic holidays, citing that as the reason they decided to bring the National Summit to Mesa. 

This national leadership in civic engagement mainly comes from MCC’s Center for Community and Civic Engagement, which encourages civil participation and provides numerous experiential and hands-on opportunities for students. 

Attending the event were students from across the state, including Cheyanna Blasi and Jerusha Jessop, members of the Eastern Arizona College (EAC) Non-Partisan club. The two came to the event to learn about ways they can encourage civic engagement on their own campus.

The two stressed the importance of voter education, especially on a campus which acts as a polling site during elections. “I think having a say in what’s happening is, it’s helpful. Like even if people underestimate their voting power, it’s helpful,” Jessop said.

Both Jessop and Blasi hope to bring back what they learned from the Summit in order to expand opportunities for civic engagement at EAC and better help students become informed voters.

“It’s okay to be scared or not know, but it’s important to know where to come and ask questions, and we have the resources to do that, and we have a really good system in place that we can begin to utilize at our college,” said Blasi.