Jefferson County chapter registers 319 students in two days at UofL

The Jefferson County KFTC Chapter had two very successful days of voter registration at University of Louisville, thanks to the organizing efforts of KFTC members Emily Nordling, Elijah McKenzie, and Tim Darst. Emily is a recent U of L graduate and arranged sponsorship for us with the Honors Society, one of the student organizations she has been active with. Elijah is a current U of L student and Bonner Scholar who reached out to Tim, a member and officer of GRASS, an organization of students working to foster environmental sustainability and awareness on campus.  GRASS sponsored a second appearance by our members to register voters on campus.

On September 27, our table sponsored by the Honors Society registered 97 voters, with a good deal of help from Honors Society volunteer Taryn Cantrell.  She says of her experience with us, “It was an amazing experience to register over 100 students, knowing that I made an impact.  Though I did not know much about KFTC before volunteering, I am very glad I got the opportunity to be acquainted because many of its issues and concerns deal with my hometown of Pikeville.  I love my hometown and hope to return there someday to give back to the place that has given so generously to me. ”

Throughout our time tabling, we had several other students registering to vote who came from far eastern and western Kentucky who expressed interest in our work.

On October 4, we had the Honors Society sponsored table again as well as a table with sponsorship by GRASS.  On this day we registered  another 222 voters!!  KFTC member Abby Miller was among the awesome volunteers who stopped by to help.  She says, “It’s important to do voter registration at the college level, when people are beginning to understand what’s really important to them that they want to advocate for.  Students seemed excited to register to vote, and it was neat to see so many people signing up all at once.  Many of them weren’t aware that they could vote in Louisville even though their permanent residency is somewhere else.”

KFTC member Brian Deis stopped by to help as well.  Turns out, he helped organize a screening of “Water Wars,” a film that deals with global demands for water supply with U of L’s Geography Club that day, and invited us over for the screening.  We popped in just for a bit after the film to thank them and highlight our work on water issues.

Thank you so much to our awesome Jefferson County KFTC members and the U of L Honors Society and GRASS who organized the registration drive, as well as to our members and those of our sponsoring student organizations who stopped by to volunteer:  Emily Nordling, Elijah McKenzie, Tim Darst, Brian Deis, Abby Miller, Amar Shah, Taryn Cantrell, and Heather Stewart.