UT Student Government competed against Oklahoma University in a voter registration contest that started on Sept. 16.
Voter registration in Texas for the November elections closed Monday and will close Friday in Oklahoma. Caden Glasscock, OU Student Government president, said the two schools will announce the winner and total number of registered voters on Friday in a joint Instagram post ahead of the Red River Rivalry football game in Dallas the next day.
Grace Kelly, UT Student Government president, said student leaders created the competition at the SEC Student Government Conference in July after the schools agreed on joint voter registration and civic engagement goals. She said each university partnered with its common rival to make it more competitive.
“(The competition) felt very powerful coming from such large schools that truly have the ability to make an impact on their students in such a large capacity,” Kelly said.
Kelly said the competition used ALL IN, an online platform that counts people registered to vote. The platform has a national awards program recognizing colleges and universities committed to increasing student voting rates. Kelly said students were only tallied in the competition if they registered to vote on campus.
Glasscock said he worked closely with Kelly to facilitate this competition as part of the Red River Rivalry. He said this contest serves as an incentive to compete on and off the field.
“It is very important that UT and OU are combining forces when it comes to a lot of these off-field activities,” Glasscock said. “It may be a competition on the field, but we are all trying to be a community and work together to help benefit society, and that is really why we’re doing this — to push out resources for students to make sure that they’re getting civically engaged.”
Kelly said student leaders from other SEC schools are committed to and excited about this cause.
“This competition is incredibly important given this is an election year, and I think this is the first time many of us are able to vote,” Kelly said. “It’s really important that at such a young age we’re embracing and utilizing our civic duty of voting and realizing that we have this right, and it’s important to use it.”
