Redistricting U | Educating people to take action

As states prepared to create new legislative districts after the release of 2020 Census data, All On The Line saw an opportunity to educate people about the democratic process and discuss an important issue: gerrymandering. Gerrymandering is the intentional drawing of legislative districts to favor a political party, leading to map manipulation, polarization, and dysfunction within our democracy. In 2021, All On The Line hosted a virtual training series on Mobilize over six weeks between July and August called Redistricting U.

Redistricting U was aimed at engaging citizens across the country and educating them about the redistricting process and the 2021 redistricting landscape. The goal of this series was to educate as many people as possible on the necessity of a fair and transparent redistricting process, how to be an advocate for this process, and drive attendees to advocacy opportunities in priority states.

The How:

All On The Line knew that the Census Bureau would be releasing precinct-level census data in September 2021, and shortly after that, the majority of the redistricting process would take place. All On The Line began developing their trainings in June 2021 and began to offer Redistricting U trainings in mid-July and into August.

Using Mobilize, All On The Line set up four unique trainings, running a total of four times each, for a total of sixteen sessions. Using Mobilize, All On The Line began recruiting volunteers to attend these upcoming sessions. Redistricting U was promoted through multiple digital channels, including tweets from former President Barack Obama and former Attorney General Eric Holder that helped launch the series. All On The Line also promoted Redistricting U by emailing their supporters, utilizing social media, and even television interviews (including an MSNBC interview with  Eric Holder).

Results & Takeaways

Over 16 training sessions, Redistricting U had 3,292 unique registrations with 1,592 participants. All On The Line saw 60% of registrations come from new volunteers, who had never signed up for an event previously, and 40% of these registrants lived within All On The Line’s priority states. With Mobilize’s automated post-event survey, Redistricting U attendees were also able to provide detailed feedback on their experience, resulting in a 97% average trainer rating and 860+ pieces of qualitative feedback. Here are some other takeaways from Redistricting U:

• Running a training series is a great way to engage volunteers and grow your volunteer base.
• Tying the trainings to actionable and timely events and actions will keep these volunteers engaged.
• Asking VIPs, organizational leaders, or other leaders in your movement to promote your event can help increase the visibility of your events.
• Recruit for your events using multiple digital channels to ensure your volunteers see your recruitment requests in their preferred digital medium.
• Using Mobilize streamlines the event management and recruitment process, and with the built-in recruitment tools and social sharing, Mobilize will increase your signups and tap into your volunteers’ social networks!

Mobilize is thankful for our partnership with All On The Line because they used our organizing platform in an innovative way to promote a training series on a relevant, timely issue to build their volunteer list and advance their cause. We are proud to partner with them and thousands of other organizations to empower volunteers to take action on advocacy initiatives that are important to them.

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