Moziah’s — RAB Source Entry #1

Source Entry #1 – 

Part 1 MLA citation –

Symonds, Alexandria. “Why Don’t Young People Vote, and What Can Be Done about It?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 8 Oct. 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/10/08/upshot/youth-voting-2020-election.html 

Part 2 Summary –

Alexandria Symonds wrote this New York Times article about the steady decline of young people voting and the many reasons that the youth aren’t voting. Symonds states that there are themes that demonstrate why younger people don’t vote more. The three themes Ms. Symonds explains that younger people not having the habit of voting because of them just starting out, or they may not have the time to vote with younger people might not have much of a flexible schedule, and other forms of activism or participating in other forms of political action such as protests or movements. Ms. Symonds even showed statistics of the youth voter turnout of 24 countries and the United States is fifth from last with 46%. Ms. Symonds then describes ways for people of the older generation to teach the youth to vote more. She has ideas for short, medium, and long term to boost youth turnout. With short term being getting young people information and details they need to register, medium term is to reduce systematic barriers and to be more welcoming for everyone will increase youth turnout, and long term is providing practical civics education. 

Part 3 Rhetorical Analysis – 

This article is from the New York Times . Alexandria Symonds is the New York Times writer for this piece and has a master’s degree from M.I.T and Bachelor’s in Colombia. Symonds’ audience is the youth but the primary audience is the old generation. Her purpose of this piece is to demonstrate ways for the old generation to increase voting turnout for younger people. She provides tons of other research and examples to further push the ways the youth can change in voting habits showing the rhetorical appeal towards logos. The genre of Symonds’ writing is op-ed. Symonds uses knowledge to push the fact on why the youth don’t vote much and how they can change it. Alexandria Symonds has gained credibility through publishing her – on the New York Times and having been with them since 2014. This article isn’t current information but is relevant to the upcoming occasion which is the 2024 presidential election. 

Part 4 Notable Quotes – 

“In one study, youth turnout increased 5.7 percentage points after students were provided with an applied voting demonstration and given the chance to cast a practice ballot” (Symonds Par 26)

“In an Op-Ed for The New York Times last year, Charlotte Hill and Jacob Grumbach wrote that same-day registration can increase turnout for every age group — and especially for younger voters” (Symonds Par 23)

“Anthony Fowler of the University of Chicago found that permitting future voters to preregister at age 16 or 17, making them automatically registered on their 18th birthday, increases both registration and turnout by 2.1 percentage points” (Symonds Par 22)

“Jan Leighley, a professor of government at American University…She and other experts recommend mobilization efforts that lead first-time voters through steps like learning how to register and by what date; how a ballot works, what’s on it and how to fill it out; where to go to cast a vote and what to do when you get there” (Symonds Par 19)

“the political scientists Charles E. Merriam and Harold F. Gosnell identified several groups of Americans whose turnout rates were comparatively low, including young people”(Symonds Par 4)

“With time, people slowly turn from “habitual nonvoters” to “habitual voters,” as a paper by Eric Plutzer, a political scientist at Penn State, puts it” (Symonds Par 6)