In September and October 2022, we held public discussions about election integrity in three West Virginia communities: Morgantown, Buckhannon, and Glenville. These events featured discussions about elections that focused on the core values of security, efficiency, and access. The resources on this page are designed to help you organize your own discussions in a classroom, club, or community organization.
You don’t need to have specialized knowledge to hold these discussions, but we would encourage you to consult the resource page on this website if technical questions about elections come up during your event. The references on that page should help you address any pressing issues.
We recommend dividing your event into two stages: 1) discussions of the case studies in small groups of around three-six people and 2) a debriefing discussion of the groups’ findings involving all participants. Each of these stages should take around 20-40 minutes, depending on the number of people attending. The event should be led by one or more facilitators who will help small groups if they get stuck and also lead the large group debriefing.
We have prepared four case studies that you may use. Two of the case studies are identical to the materials we used in our events and cover same day voter registration and absentee voting. One of our two new case studies is an alternate version about absentee voting. The other new case study addresses voter identification. Each case study includes basic background material about the issue along with questions that can help facilitate group discussions.
We have also created videos that you may use to help train your event facilitators, or play at your event to help prepare participants for the discussion. In the first video, Professor Samuel Workman describes the overall goals of the project and talks about the role of values in our discussions of politics.
In the second video, Professor Erik Herron defines the three values that you can apply to the case studies: security, efficiency, and access.
In the third video, Professor Herron talks in more detail about how to organize your conversations around values, providing an example from former West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller.
The memo is an item from the archives held at West Virginia University: A&M 4050, Senator John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV papers, West Virginia and Regional History Center, West Virginia University Libraries. https://rockefeller.lib.wvu.edu/
In the fourth video, Professor Workman talks about the issues that were most important to participants in Morgantown, Buckhannon, and Glenville in Fall 2022.
Our events also featured a greeting from former West Virginia Secretary of State, Natalie Tennant. She talks about the importance of holding meaningful discussions about elections and reflecting on our own values.
If you are thinking about holding your own event and have questions that aren’t answered here, please contact us at electionintegritywv@gmail.com. We’d love to hear about your events, share your stories and pictures, and add you to our map.
Election Integrity in the Mountain State 