Loyola Votes

Loyola University Chicago law student Grant Bosich is among a group of student volunteers leading a campaign this fall on Loyola’s campuses to register students to vote. Taking on a leadership role in the democratic process might seem natural for a future lawyer, but Bosich’s motivation comes from an unexpected source: his own failure to vote in the 2016 election.

“I made every excuse for why I didn't vote in 2016—lack of enthusiasm for a particular candidate, a long primary cycle—but in reality, I just made a mistake,” Bosich said. “I don't want any student on this campus to have any excuse not to vote.”

So last spring, Bosich joined in an effort by the Loyola Law Democrats to promote voter information and registration on campus. Then he jumped in to the university-wide campaign to register students to vote in advance of the 2018 election. And the fact that Loyola as an institution has committed itself to promoting civic engagement among the student body has only further inspired Bosich to get involved.

It is an important message at a time when the country is facing sharp partisan divides, but the commitment to civic engagement is nothing new for Loyola. Encouraging students to be active in the political process stems from the university’s Jesuit, Catholic mission and its commitment to social justice. Loyola promotes these values in the classroom and through service in the wider community, but it also aims to teach students that they have a voice to speak on the issues that matter to them at the ballot box.

“Voting is important not only to elect the best people; it is also where you can begin to affect positive change, however you view that change,” said Philip Hale, Loyola’s vice president of government affairs and civic engagement. “Voting is the foundation of everything that follows, being involved in your communities and getting to know your neighbors. We talk a lot about educating men and women for others, and the other is your neighbor, the other is the person who thinks differently from you.”

Fighting for social justice

This type of participation is even more important today, in a time where theology professor Michael Murphy, PhD, says students feel like institutions are failing them.

Murphy, Loyola’s director of Catholic Studies and of the Hank Center for Catholic Intellectual Heritage, said that he used to worry students were complacent and disengaged. But today’s Loyola students are attentive to and hungry for justice—and increasingly engaged in this political moment. “Five years ago, so many students were not voting—despite my pleas. Not today,” he said.

Murphy has seen students in the Catholic Studies minor take an active role in working toward positive change in the Catholic Church. He’s been inspired by Loyola’s Student Environmental Alliance, who are using scientific reasoning to challenge leaders on critical environmental issues. And every day, he speaks to students who are making a difference in service, scholarship, and prayer.

“This is the hope for anybody who loves democracy and the beautiful hope of the American project, and more importantly, the human project—our lives together in God,” he said.