Texas High Schools Are Required to Have Voter Registration for Students and Most Don’t Do It

Most students turn 18 while they're still in high school and you should register to vote when you turn that age. In Texas, high schools are required to have a voter registration set up for students and most don't.

Everyone should register to vote when they turn 18 and here in Texas the state makes it easy for students to do so in their own high school. The high schools are supposed to have voter registration forms. This is a state law and has been since 1985, turns out not a lot of the high schools are following this state law.

In 2018, only 38% of the high schools held voter registration activities. High schools are required, once again by LAW, to do at least two voter registration activities every year. The Texas Civil Rights Project found that a lot of high schools are simply ignoring this law and it's for one simple reason. If it's not enforced, no one is going to follow it.

The Fortworth Star-Telegram says that the Secretary of State’s office doesn’t strongly enforce it. Also, if a high school does not do those voter registration activities, nothing happens to them. No fines will be coming their way because of this and that has me asking one question. What is the point of the law?

If the law is to get Texas kids registered to vote, why even have this law if no one is doing anything to enforce it? Some students said that most of these voter registration events are done as a part of their government class, in the schools that actually follow the law.

According to a map from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, they have which high schools requested voter registration forms from the Secretary of State. I see no high schools in the Wichita Falls ISD that requested these forms. In fact, the only high school in our area that did was Holiday for the 2018 school year.

I tried calling the WFISD for information on this, but their offices are closed till the 8th. I for one hope that our schools are complying with this law. These new adults should be getting registered to vote and high schools are required to help them to do so.