Ready to vote. Ready to lead.
03Young people have always led. This is how you lead now.
Decisions about schools, college costs, jobs, health care and housing get made whether or not young people are in the room. You don't need a title or a ballot of your own to change who shows up — just your phone and the people you already talk to.
What you can do
Four things, in order of effort
Share the voter tool
Post the link in your stories, group chats and campus or team channels. Ask everyone who sees it to do one thing: check their registration, find their polling place or set reminders.
Text ten people directly
A personal message moves people a repost doesn't. Start with friends, classmates and coworkers, then widen out to family and neighbors. The guide has six sample texts ready to send.
Follow up and confirm
Ask people to text you back once they've checked. It isn't about collecting anyone's information — it's how you know the message landed and who still needs a nudge.
Run a 15-minute outreach
Set up at a game, a club meeting, a dorm event or the cafeteria with a QR code and a charged phone. The guide scripts the whole action from introduction to close.
Download
Made for students & youth
Also useful: the Read Aloud for Democracy guide, which works for any audience, and the full library.
Take action
Register, check and cast your ballot
Every task between deciding to vote and having your ballot counted, in one place. Check your registration in under a minute, fix it if something's wrong, and set a reminder so a deadline never decides this for you.
- Works in every state
- Nonpartisan — no candidates, no parties
- Nothing on this site is required first
Register to vote
Start or update your registration in your state. Most people finish in about two minutes.
Open 02Verify your registration
Confirm you're still on the rolls and that your address is current. Worth doing even if you voted last time — records get purged.
Open 03Request an absentee ballot
Vote from home if getting to a polling place on a workday with children in tow isn't realistic.
Open 04Get election reminders
Deadline and Election Day reminders for your state, so the date arrives with warning instead of as news.
Open 05Check your ballot
See the races and measures you'll actually be voting on, including the school board and local seats that shape children's daily lives.
OpenHosted by Children's Defense Fund Action and powered by Vote.org. Opens in a new tab. Nonpartisan — no candidate or party is endorsed.
Sign up
Take the Ready to Lead Challenge
Tell us you're in and we'll send the guide, reminders keyed to your state's deadlines, and the occasional nudge to keep your network election-ready.
03 · Students & YouthWelcome to the campaign
You're in. Watch for an email within a day or two with your materials and the next thing you can do. Start with the resource library while you wait.