The Center for Teen Empowerment entices Bostonians with good old-fashioned block parties. The youth civic engagement group invites prospective voters off the street to come enjoy music, food that ranges from Caribbean fare to apple cider donuts, and giveaways like pins.
The center’s civic engagement coordinator, Harison Clark, says that these block parties offer people more than an invitation to vote. They provide an antidote for burnout.
“That helps you forget about your worries for at least a couple of hours. And that’s long enough for us to move in, let you know when the election is going to be,” Clark says. “That carries you into the rest of your civic process, your civic duty.”
For Clark, drawing people in is only half the battle. In fighting to get citizens involved in their democracy, he has found engaging his Gen Z peers especially challenging.
Final voter registration rates remain to be seen, but Tufts University’s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement data demonstrates that as of October, voter registration has declined among 18-to-29-year-olds in Massachusetts since the 2022 midterm election.
Clark is 27, and he describes “apathy” amongst his generation. He admits that at times, he has been a “victim” of it too. Clark understands the challenges that Gen Z faces, and when he tries to connect with prospective voters, he hears that they are exhausted.
“The older half of Gen Z, we’re absolutely being crushed right now,” Clark says. “My student loan payments are crazy. Jobs are hard to come by, not paying as much to keep up with the cost of living. All of these things are things that take you out of the community-based mindset.”
Yanlin Ren, a Gen Z senior CIRCLE researcher, would describe his generation differently. He says that the notion that it is apathetic is a “misconception” that can be corrected with data.
CIRCLE is collaborating with the youth voter initiative When We All Vote to survey Gen Z about their voting sentiments and behavior. In a 2026 report, nearly 90% of Gen Z respondents identified as being likely to vote.
There has been a spike in engagement among Gen Z’s youngest voters. CIRCLE found that while the generation’s registration rate has declined overall, there is an uptick among 18 -and 19-year-olds.
Kalisha Dessources Figures, When We All Vote’s senior advisor, says that Gen Z’s “connection to the issues is there.” Survey respondents often listed cost of living, housing costs, and healthcare as political priorities. While the data indicates that Gen Z is invested in politics, who is on the ballot is a factor in their decision to vote.
“Gen Z really needs to see authenticity. They need to be able to see the connection between what they care about and making it out to vote,” Figures says. “If they’re able to see candidates and leaders who can make a difference on those issues, the economy, affordability, then they are willing to engage.”
Harvard law student Catherine Hodgens registered to vote at 18 because her parents and friends expected her to. She has voted consistently since then, but Hodgens is unsure if she will participate in the upcoming midterms. At 27, she has been pulling back from politics.
“It’s hard for me to find someone I align with,” Hodgens said. “I feel like everything’s polarized and it’s hard to find a middle ground.”
Hodgens is lukewarm on the Massachusetts midterm candidates but said that she “aligns with different parts of them.”
Almost half of CIRCLE and When We All Vote’s Gen Z survey respondents indicated they are unsure whether their vote matters or do not believe it does.
Hodgens is teetering on that front. After saying that her vote might matter “in the grand scheme of things,” she reflected for a moment and added that “in reality, I don’t know that it would.”
Tey Barbour, a 20-year-old Harvard basketball player, voted early this year. He sees it as an opportunity to “see what you want in this country come to fruition.”
Barbour’s friends in Boston vote, but things are different back home. He reports that many of his friends in Virginia do not vote and see it as a “hassle.” This frustrates Barbour.
“When you hear people complain about this and about that and how they don’t like certain policies and then they don’t wanna go vote, they don’t want to exercise their civic duty. It’s just like why complain at all if you’re not gonna do anything about it,” Barbour said.
The CIRCLE and When We All Vote survey found that almost half of Gen Z does not identify with a political party. Figures says that it is a “misconception” that it can be reached through partisan organizing and has found young voters are more aligned with issues than party affiliations.
Ren has also seen the landscape changing.
“The majority of the Gen Z is diverse,” he says. “And we need new strategies to reach out to them. The demographics change, the influx of information, new ways of media.”
Social media is a new frontier for accessing young voters, and Clark says that it “has been a really big catalyst on being that first touch most people have with civic engagement, elected officials, policy, and candidates.”
The Center for Teen Empowerment’s social media covers candidates, ballot questions, and civic involvement. Clark says that he and his team “shamelessly partake in the gimmicks and the trends,” on TikTok.
When We All Vote goes a step further by partnering with content creators. Figures says that it helps spread the organization’s message through voices Gen Z trusts and reaches people that might not organically encounter When We All Vote through social media or other forms of outreach.
That outreach has included the Pass the Mic to Gen Z listening tour, which engaged Gen Z at the Lollapalooza music festival and the FIFA World Cup games. Figures says that the tour was an effort to “listen to young voters before we get out there and tell them to go and register to vote, go out and vote.”
As the midterm approaches, University of Massachusetts Lowell student Ian Burns is doing a lot of listening. He is staffing tables to engage voters as part of his college’s Student Public Interest Research Group. Through tabling, Burns has had frank conversations with his fellow students about why they vote – or do not.
Many students tell Burns that they do not have the information they need to vote. He fills those gaps on a practical level by teaching them how to register, talking through the ballot questions, and pointing them towards reliable resources.
The impact of knowledge on voting participation is reflected in CIRCLE and When We All Vote’s survey. Respondents’ top reported barriers to voting are a lack of information about candidates and ballot issues.
Burns finds that learning about elections can be “scary” for students and that lacking information is an emotional barrier, not just a logistical one.
“People don’t want to feel like they don’t know these things already because they feel like they should already know what’s going on,” Burns said.
When he talks to students that are resistant to voting, Burns’ argument is simple.
“Change that you want won’t start unless you vote, even if you think that your vote doesn’t matter. You being there and voting is still something.”
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