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Lehigh Senior High School claimed first place for the 2020-2021 High School Voter Registration Challenge this year with 84 registrations.

Second place went to North Fort Myers High School with 45 registrations, and East Lee County High School claimed third place with 37 registrations.

In 2018, Lee Elections decided to have individual trophies for the three places, so the schools could keep it on display instead of the trophy rotating schools each year.

Lee County Elections Community Services Director Juan Diez said the High School Voter Registration Challenge began in 1999 in many counties in Florida, if not all of them.

This year the challenge took on a different shape due to the pandemic not allowing outside visitors into the schools, such as Lee Elections.

“Before the pandemic we used to go to the schools and do either classroom presentations, auditorium (presentations), or cafeteria voter registration drives. What we did in 2020 was created a PowerPoint presentation with audio with the same information that we used to give to students in the classrooms,” Diez said. “We created a video on how to fill out the voter registration.”

The challenge invites all of the high schools in Lee County to participate, as well as charter schools, which typically results in invitations being sent to the principals and social studies teachers at 15 to 16 schools. This year seven high schools participated in the High School Voter Registration Challenge, compared to 11 or 12 in previous years.

Those that participated included Cape Coral High School, Dunbar High School, East Lee County High School, Lehigh Senior High School, Mariner High School, North Fort Myers High School and Oasis High School.

Diez believes the participation was lower because Lee Elections was not able to go into the schools and talk with the students and answer any questions they may have had. This year the teachers were given those duties, which, on top of what they were responsible for this year due to the pandemic, made more work for them.

“We were trying to do everything possible not to give them more work. We also offered Zoom presentations,” Diez said about showing the presentations and answering questions to have that interaction with students.

One high school alone had six classes that participated in Zoom.

The challenge resulted in a total of 248 verified registrations. In addition, there were 35 students who updated their voter information.

“That is pretty good considering all the changes teachers had to go through with the pandemic — online classes and then students coming back to the schools,” Diez said. “We were lucky to get this number.”

For the first time, in addition to receiving paper applications, Lee Elections allowed the students to register to vote online. He said although it is always better to register in paper form because the signature is in pen, they wanted to reach students online as well.

“When you do it online, it pulls the signature from the DMV. Sometimes that changes. The paper has the latest one (signature),” Diez said.

Lee Elections went to the schools that participated in the challenge and picked up the paper registrations, so it would not get lost in the mail.

“We started the challenge in September 2020 and the deadline was October,” Diez said to make sure students met the deadline to register for the General Election. “As long as students register and turn 18, they can vote in the General Election in November.”

In addition to the challenge educating the students about the rules of voting, as well as all the information one needs to know about voting, Diez said they also conduct student government elections for North Fort Myers High School, Island Coast High School and Estero High School.

Diez said the schools send them a list of the candidates and they create ballots. Lee Elections then brings the voting machines and booths to the schools, so the students can vote during their lunch breaks. He said they then present the results at the end of the election.

“They use the same equipment that adults use when voting live. They get the I Voted stickers,” Diez said. 

He said it gives the students an opportunity to be apart of the process, so when they turn 18 and vote during an election they do not feel afraid once the time comes.

Next year, they hope to get back into the schools for the High School Voter Registration Challenge. Diez said they are also going to try to work directly with the school district to see if they can help spread the word about the challenge.