Make local democracy the default for students who moved.

Roughly 5 million American college students live in a state different from where they grew up. Almost none of them vote where they actually live. We think that's a problem — for the students and for the places they live.

Why we exist

The civic infrastructure that exists for college students is almost entirely focused on absentee ballots and home-state voting. That's important — but it leaves you disconnected from the city, county, and state where you spend 9 months of the year. You don't know who your mayor is, when the school board votes, or what's on the next ballot. So you don't show up. And local races that affect renters, students, and young people get decided by turnout that skews 30+ years older than you are.

VoteU flips the default. We onboard you to your college address, walk you through real residency rules, and surface every ballot you can legally cast where you live. No political content, no candidate endorsements, no party signups. Just the calendar, the deadlines, and the links.

What we are not

• We're not a PAC, a campaign, or a vendor to either.
• We don't tell you who to vote for or how to think about an issue.
• We don't sell, share, or rent your data — to advertisers, parties, or anyone.
• We're not affiliated with any school or government body.

How we're funded

VoteU is an independent nonprofit project. Funding comes from small individual donations and non-partisan civic-engagement grants. Operating costs are minimal — we run on email, a small hosted datastore, and donated time. Anything we raise above costs goes to expanding state coverage and translating the product into Spanish and Mandarin.

The legal bit, in plain English

Every state has slightly different rules about whether a student can use their dorm address to register. We surface what we know on each state page, but we are not a law firm — for the actual rules, talk to your state's Secretary of State or a local election official. Both are linked from your state page.

Get involved

We'd love help from organizers on campus, designers, election lawyers, and anyone who wants to write copy that actually sounds like a 19-year-old.