NYU: Designate Election Day as a University Holiday

New York University has a serious problem with civic engagement and voter turnout.
If the University is truly committed to student enfranchisement, NYU must designate Election Day a University Holiday. Currently, the NYU Law School, Columbia University, Fordham University, and Barnard College all designate Election Day as a holiday. Students should not be forced to balance school, work, and family in order to exercise their right to vote.

This policy would help to address many of the issues in voter turnout which the University currently faces. According to a 2016 Tufts University report, New York University's voter turnout rate lags behind the institutional average by 2.6% and behind all private research institutions by 5.3%. Election Day off would have an immediate impact on accessibility, and it would meaningfully prioritize voting and civic engagement on-campus.

NYU is among the largest private universities in the country. According to the 2018 student fact sheet, 12,022 undergraduate students are permanent residents of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. This means that 45% of the undergraduate student body lives in proximity to their voting districts and would be immediately impacted by the passage of this resolution. Even more students from elsewhere in the United States choose to register in New York during their undergraduate career.

We must come together as a community and urge President Andrew Hamilton to publicly support the University Senate Resolution to Designate Election Day as a University Holiday.