Christopher Carter worked hard up until the presidential election to register and turn out his classmates to vote. Carter, a second-year political science student, attends the country’s oldest historically Black college, Cheyney University in Pennsylvania.

“Our efforts were very successful; we were able to register almost everyone on campus. It took a lot of work. We had someone sitting in the cafeteria everyday registering students to vote and then reminding people to go out and vote,” says Carter, a vice president of his school’s NAACP chapter, which organized a get-out-the-vote campaign on the school’s 1,000-student campus.

Young people like Carter poured out to vote in record numbers during the presidential election but that does not necessarily mean they will stay involved in politics, or even their communities.

Motivating young people during a highly contentious election is one thing, keeping them involved in community organizing and volunteerism is another.

It isn’t so easy, says Dr. Pedro Noguera, an urban sociologist at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development. Noguera says it is too early to tell whether young people will stay involved beyond the campaign season.

“The candidacy of Barack Obama really appealed to young people. But whether or not that translates to ongoing involvement remains to be seen,” he says. “Getting organized around an election has a very definite goal, but a lot of things this country needs to work on don’t have such clear targets.” 

Noguera is optimistic that the new administration’s policies will keep youth engaged. “What I’m hoping is the new administration will get people to continue to work hard where service is needed, whether tutoring in schools or working with the elderly or homeless,” he adds. “I think that can happen because Obama has an organizing background, and I think he understands the need to engage young people in their communities.”