Young people could win $3K for a video promoting civic participation and voter engagement

In an effort to promote civic engagement and increase voter participation in the Southeast L.A. (SELA) area during midterm elections, a new challenge is inviting high school and college students to submit their videos for the opportunity to win scholarships of up to $3,000.

The challenge “¿Y si sí votamos?” (What if we actually vote?) encourages students ages 16-25 to create a 30-90 second video on civic engagement and participation in the local electoral process. 

The videos must be original, positive, non-partisan and factual. Videos shouldn’t endorse or oppose a candidate or political party or ballot measure.

“This year, under a new strategy,  we are trying to reach out to get to the young voters,” said Francisco Moreno, executive director with Council of Mexican Federations in North America (COFEM). “It is important for them to take the initiative because they are the new adults and this is a very innovative challenge.” 

Moreno said they are focusing on this group especially because it is often taken for granted. The challenge is an educational, nonpartisan, civic engagement initiative by the SELA Decides campaign, which includes six partner organizations: COFEM, AltaMed, SELA Collaborative, Pat Brown Institute, CalMatters and NewStart Housing.

Fighting against Civic Deserts

With this challenge, there are high hopes to create more awareness and motivate more people to vote, whether it is for the first time or for someone who hasn’t voted for years and is coming back. 

In 2020, Loyola Marymount University found through research that L,A. County has several cities and unincorporated areas known as civic deserts.

Civic deserts describe areas where residents live, work, and participate in community life but have very limited access to the institutions, resources, relationships and decision-making structures.

Wilma Franco, executive director with the SELA Collaborative, said that this lack of resources really shapes civic life. 

“SELA isn’t necessarily a civic desert because its residents lack civic engagement,” she said. “The problem is that SELA has historically had more civic participation than civic infrastructure.”

Franco said if you compare cities like Beverly Hills with SELA cities, it is clear that more voting centers exist in Beverly Hills. Aside from South Gate, which has the most voting centers, most of the SELA cities have one, two or maybe three voting centers. The ballot boxes are also very limited.

She said it is not very common for voters to go down their street and find a polling center like in a school or park.

“So one of the things that we've also been doing is working with the county, working with the SELA Leaders Network, to bring more voting sites, ballot boxes and access to civic participation,” she said. 

The rules

Youth interested in participating in the video challenge have until Oct. 31 to submit their video. The guidelines indicate that the video must be uploaded in a social media site like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook or YouTube shorts and make it public. They have to tag the six partners.  

Purchased views, use of AI or paid promotions will result in disqualification.

There will be three grand prizes announced on Nov. 16; First place wins $3,000, second place wins $2,000 and third place wins $1,000.

Additionally, there will be four special recognitions of $500 for the most inspiring story, the best use of a dicho (phrase), the community choice award and rising civic leader. 

For full guidelines and application, go to the video challenge form.