Students Encourage Voter Participation Through the Election Project
With messages such as “Voting is Key” and “Rock the Vote,” students in Professor Rob Heller’s class once again designed billboards in partnership with Lamar Advertising to encourage Tennesseeans to vote this November.
Heller said six billboard designs shared with Lamar Advertising began running on digital billboards throughout Tennessee on October 4 and the company plans to keep sharing them until the day before the election.
Heller’s graphic design class is just one example this election season of students gaining invaluable hands-on experience in the industry while also educating audiences on civic topics.
That is the purpose of the Election Project, a coordinated reporting initiative of the School of Journalism and Media and The Media Center in partnership with The Howard H. Baker Jr. School of Public Policy and Public Affairs (The Baker School). Whether in the classroom or as part of one of the College of Communication and Information’s student media properties, students are getting involved in election reporting.
“A functioning democracy depends upon an informed and engaged citizenry, and the role of the journalist is central to informing voters. I’m proud that our students are doing just that, reporting on relevant issues and preparing the electorate–particularly the younger electorate–to carry out their civic duty,” said School of Journalism and Media director Amy Jo Coffey. “We’re thrilled to have The Baker School as a partner in some of our coverage in this shared mission.”
Senior Emma Love said this fall, both inside and outside the classroom, she has been working on how to use the various tools in her media toolbox to provide voter information to the public.
As managing editor of The Daily Beacon, she has been assisting with election coverage by working on different products encouraging voter participation like The Beacon’s voters guide.
In her social journalism class with Assistant Professor Mustafa Oz, she worked on creating social media content for Tik Tok and other platforms to encourage students to vote.
One project she was really excited about was designing billboards as part of Heller’s class. As a child, she dreamed about having something on a billboard one day but over time that dream faded. Prior to Heller’s class, she had very little design training, so working on this project was difficult in the beginning.
However, as she learned more about graphic design, that childlike excitement returned and she fulfilled that childhood dream. Her billboard—the one that states “Voting is Key”—is on display along I-75 in Loudon.
“I just had to brainstorm the visuals for the ‘Voting is Key’ billboard but it was definitely exciting to think I could have something on a billboard,” Love said.
Junior Jordan Smitherman said, while she is passionate about sports and would like to go into sports media and marketing, she felt the graphic class’s voting project provided her with an opportunity to extend her creative boundaries. She designed the “Rock the Vote” billboard and, though it was a learning process with lots of steps, she was happy with the final product.
“It proved to me that I could do creative work outside of sports, and I had a lot of fun in the creative process trying to bring my vision to life,” Smitherman said. “I see it as adding to my toolbox. The more tools I have and the more things I know how to do, the better.”
Heller’s media graphics class’s partnership with Lamar Advertising dates back more than a decade when he had the class design yard signs to encourage students to vote in partnership with the then-named The Baker Center.
Following the success of the yard signs, Heller thought the next logical step was billboards, and reached out to Lamar Advertising to collaborate. The first billboards designed by the school were displayed ahead of the 2012 presidential election. Since then, Heller’s class has worked with Lamar Advertising to create voter participation designs for their billboards during presidential election years.
“I am so proud of my students,” Heller said. “After all these years it still excites me to drive around and see their work on display. My students and I are eternally grateful for the generosity of Lamar Advertising over the last twelve years. Every time that we looked up to see our designs on the giant billboards, it never failed to put a huge smile on our faces.”
Heller said projects like this embody the Volunteer spirit that calls on everyone at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, to use their talents for the public good. He added that encouraging people to exercise their right to vote is a public service, and he is glad he gets to continue the tradition of encouraging civic engagement in his class while also teaching them about graphic design.
Director of The Media Center Director Nick Geidner said with the work in classes such as Heller’s and at media properties like The Daily Beacon and The Volunteer Channel (TVC), the Election Project has created a comprehensive resource for voters, especially among college-age students where turnout is generally much lower than other voting demographics. He said the project will eventually culminate with a live Election Day show to be streamed on TVC’s YouTube channel.
“Our students have been doing some amazing work covering the 2024 election,” Geidner said. “With The Media Center being embedded into the College of Communication and Information, we are uniquely positioned to provide comprehensive coverage on elections which only adds to the media landscape in Tennessee.”
Visit cci.utk.edu/elect to learn more about the Election Project and election coverage.
Students Encourage Voter Participation Through the Election Project written by Ernest Rollins and originally published on the College of Communication & Information site.