By Elizabeth Faragi
When turning 18, some people rush to register to vote, like freshman student Haley Olstein, who did so on her 18th birthday — the day after election day. Others never register to vote or look at the polls. Some register to vote but never exercise their right.
Overwhelmingly, University of Maryland students are registered to vote. But are they voting? Not really.
Olstein, a psychology major and business minor student, is registered to vote but could not vote on Nov. 4 because her birthday is on the fifth. She is an out-of-state student, so she is voting in New York.
“If you don’t live in the state that you go to school in, it’s kind of a hassle,” Olstein said. “You kind of have to make that effort [to vote].”
Olstein is not alone. Many out-of-state students will not vote because they have to complete registration for mail-in ballots, fill in said ballots and then mail them out again, all before elections. Olstein said she has yet to fill out the paperwork to register for mail-in ballots.
Konstance Calvi, a sophomore family health major, is also an out-of-state student. Calvi didn’t get the chance to vote in the 2024 or 2025 elections because she did not get the paperwork done in time.
“I was working on the paperwork to be allowed to vote in a different state,” Calvi said, “but I never mailed it and then I ended up not voting.”
Other students like mail-in options, including in-state students. Junior government and politics and criminology major Addyson Miller voted in the 2024 presidential election by mail-in ballot.
“It’s nice because, at the University of Maryland, you can drop off your mail-in ballot to Stamp at their mailbox there,” Miller said. “It’s very accessible.”
Other students are often so busy with college life that voting falls to the bottom of their task list. Allie Kelly, a sophomore marketing major, voted in the 2024 presidential election but not in the 2025 Maryland elections.
“It just slipped my mind,” Kelly said. “I was stressed and I didn’t really have time.”
For in-state students, voting in person is easy. Kelly did at Stamp for the 2024 presidential election. She waited in line for an hour and a half.
Kanza Ihsan, a sophomore psychology and elementary education major, also voted in person during the 2024 presidential election. She drove half an hour to her hometown and voted at her elementary school.
Ihsan did not vote in the 2025 Maryland elections.
“There wasn’t as much publicity about it,” Ihsan said. “I didn’t know as much about what was happening or what candidates were running. It wasn’t directly on my feed or my daily media.”
This is a common feeling for students at this university. Kelly added she didn’t know much about the Maryland elections in 2025 and didn’t vote. Calvi said she didn’t even realize there was a major election in 2025 for New Jersey.
Miller said that she is going to vote in the upcoming primary elections in June, but has currently not educated herself about the candidates.
Whether students are in-state or out-of-state, many register to vote but aren’t always exercising their right. While most students voted in the presidential election in 2024, the other elections and primary elections are still important and don’t seem to get many student voters.
There are great resources online about how to vote and how students can educate themselves on upcoming elections and candidates. Students can visit studentvote.org to view a map and click on their state to see upcoming elections, resources and check their voting registration status in their state.
In addition, rockthevote.org has great resources for students and includes details about what elections are happening in each state and when mail-in ballots should be mailed to arrive on time.
For in-state students, the Maryland State Board of Elections website provides information on the upcoming primary elections in June and all candidates on the ballot.
College students are in a unique position where we are always being told we have the power to make change. Using the resources on campus and online to vote and participate in our democracy is just one of the ways we can begin to make the world a better place.
Featured Image: The exterior of Thurgood Marshall Hall, home of UMD’s School of Public Policy. Photo by Paige Trendell.