Our research shows that when people have dialogue about the issues they care about, they develop a sense of their own role in making change and are much more interested in learning about voting.
New voters can visit the Learn About the Issues section of this website to find user-friendly issue information.
Here are some additional resources you can use to promote and facilitate dialogue about the issues:
California Voices
In 2004, adult literacy students representing new voters and less likely voters held an issues summit in four locations around the state via videoconference. They selected four issues and invited other adult learners to write about their views on these issues. The resulting California Voices Report is a rare glimpse into the perspectives of Californians usually not represented in the policy debate. You can download the 1-page issue worksheets they used on Education, Health Care, Transportation and Housing or use the whole report as a discussion starter.
Community Discussion Guide
What should our children learn in school? is a 4-page guide designed to help facilitate a discussion of education issues. Adapted by community members from the National Issues Forums model, this guide has been tested in over 30 community forums and is successful at stimulating civic engagement with a wide variety of audiences. This format also provides a good example of how to organize discussions for any issue.
Easy Voter Guide Workshop
This step-by-step workshop outline will help you guide participants to discover their own motivations for voting – and then follow-through with education about the voting process. Field-tested in over 40 settings, this workshop has been designed so that members of the target audience can help lead the workshop for their peers.
Visit the workshop with video page to download the 27-page outline and see video clips of the workshop in action.
The Change Agent: Voting in the 2004 Elections
Published by The New England Literacy Resource Center/World Education, this special issue of their newsletter – the Change Agent – is a wealth of resources that can help promote voter involvement, including 12 pages of issue worksheets.
We invite suggestions for other links and resources for nonpartisan voter education and outreach. Please send them to us.