by Brendon Davis
The 2024 election is well under way. The candidates have made their cases to the country, early voting has started, and many are left to do their last round of door-knocking before waiting for the results. As election day approaches, one issue that continues to nag at me concerns an important group that I have been a part of for the last eight years: STEM students. Undergraduate and graduate students in STEM fields are a foundational part of scientific productivity and innovation, and they are the future of this country’s technical expertise. That is why I was so surprised to learn that STEM students vote in elections at consistently lower frequencies than students in other fields.
In both the 2020 and 2022 national elections, almost all major STEM disciplines voted at rates lower than the national average rate for all students (the exception was in Agriculture and Natural Resources students, go you!). This might make sense at first glance—the only science we don’t study is political science, after all. But upon close consideration, I find it fundamentally odd that STEM students would be disconnected from politics. Most university research funding comes from the federal government and there are numerous roles for science professionals in policymaking and administration of the law. It goes all the way down to your state and local government, which can affect the ability to do environmental research, analyze city or county data, or access healthcare. Science is entwined in government, and yet STEM students lag behind their peers in voting.
So why is STEM student voting lower? It’s not a far leap to suggest it is because scientists are trained to be objective thinkers; there is no political spin in the laboratory. The “unbiased” nature of science suggests that it will continue on regardless of what is happening behind closed doors in DC. A student in a STEM field can exist in ignorance of politics for quite a long time (until they apply for their first NIH grant, that is). Many students may also know they will end up in a privately funded sector; computer scientists end up at the big tech companies and engineers shoot for some large engineering firm. The largest entity that may directly affect their lives is not the government but a corporation, so effort is understandably put more towards networking and navigating the occupational landscape.
Unfortunately, science is political. The governance of many STEM issues has become a polarized debate. The ideas that those in the scientific community may see as largely objective are instead ideological stances to politicians. The list might be longer than you think. Climate change, in vitro fertilization, science funding, sustainable farming, renewable energy, healthcare, reproductive health, science immigration, data sharing, cybersecurity, biosecurity, genome sequencing protections, artificial intelligence, international research cooperation, and the list goes on. The response to COVID itself gave birth to a multitude of “hot takes” from politicians who often ignored scientific recommendations. Not to mention that whether a STEM professional’s career intersects with politics or not, certainly their life outside the lab will be influenced by their elected officials in a multitude of ways.
If you are a student in STEM—or any voting-eligible American—there are ample reasons to vote in the 2024 election. Whether you vote as a scientist, as a student, or just as a citizen of the United States, you have the power to decide what issues and stances are most important to you and vote for the representatives that best reflect those views.
For those international students without a vote in US elections, remember that you still have a voice. You can talk to your friends about how policies might affect you. We need more of those kinds of conversations anyway. Everyone—non-citizens and citizens—can engage in advocacy efforts around your campus and with local organizations (JHSPDG organizes a number of events in Baltimore and DC!). You can also write to any of your representatives whether you can vote or not; members of Congress represent everyone in their district, not just those that vote for them! There is something that all of us can do, and that starts at the fundamental level of casting a vote if you have one and using your voice no matter what.
2024 is our time to STEMulate the Vote (ha, get it?). Do your research on the issues at hand and the races you can vote in, from the President, to your members of Congress, to your local officials. While you are at it, recruit some friends to vote too. November 5th is election day, but depending on your state, you may have to register in advance of that to vote. Go to vote.gov for information on voter registration and how to vote in your region.
Brendon Davis is a PhD Candidate in the Cellular and Molecular Biology Program at Johns Hopkins University. He is studying the mechanisms of epigenetic inheritance in dividing Drosophila stem cells. Brendon is also part of the 2024 cohort for the ASBMB Advocacy Training Program, and he serves as a Science Policy Coordinator for the Johns Hopkins Science Policy and Diplomacy Group, through which he interacts with policymakers and expands his science communication skills.