Missouri State University’s campus voting initiative, Paws to the Polls, celebrates five years of service to the campus and Springfield communities this year.

The initiative’s faculty coordinator, Dr. Suzanne Walker-Pacheco, worked with 14 students to form Paws to the Polls – frequently shortened to “Paws” – in the spring of 2020. Recently, she completed its five-year report and was pleased with the findings.

“We’ve done a lot. We’re making an impact,” she said.

In its first five years, Paws accomplished several of its original goals. These include a First Year Foundations curriculum component, a non-partisan booklet on voting information, an annual voting fair on campus, and coordinating candidate panels and forums. They also traveled to the Missouri state capitol building in Jefferson City, where they met with legislators and advocated for voting access.

Walker-Pacheco admits she wasn’t sure at first exactly how the initiative would take shape.

“It was the sort of thing I wanted to do, something related to engaging more students in voting,” she explained. “I had no idea what that might have been, but I knew that this was a wonderful opportunity to get information, especially nonpartisan information, out to students and a number of other people.”

Now, Paws not only serves the campus and local communities, it has become a model for state and national institutions. In 2024, Paws members presented at two national conventions, including the League of Women Voters. Walker-Pacheco also serves as section editor for Civic and Voter Engagement for the eJournal of Public Affairs, which helps disseminate campus voter information more broadly.

Anniversary highlights initiative’s purpose

Paws’ fifth anniversary is significant for Missouri State alumni and former Paws members Liz Wertz and Zion Riffe-Stevens.

“Paws is an initiative that is very close to my heart,” said Wertz, an original Paws member. The five-year anniversary “highlights the importance and vitality of its mission to the community, as well as it impact on students involved in leadership.”

Wertz currently serves as Regional Organizer for Missouri Jobs with Justice. She is also a co-president of the Springfield chapter of the League of Women Voters.

“Seeing Paws reach its fifth year is a huge milestone and one worth celebrating,” Stevens noted. “Paws has never been about checking boxes. It’s about building a culture of civic responsibility and participation.”

As part of his duties as a graduate assistant in Missouri State’s Department of Political Science and Philosophy, Stevens was assigned to work with Paws. He immediately embraced the initiative’s vision and boosted its profile on campus, according to Walker-Pacheco.

Stevens now serves as Fundraising and Outreach Coordinator at the Drew Lewis Foundation. He is also Communications and Public Relations Chair for Springfield’s League of Women Voters chapter, a board member of PFLAG Southwest Missouri and an advisory board member for Paws.

Motivated to educate

Walker-Pacheco, a professor in the Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Gerontology (SAG), started exploring voter education issues in the fall of 2019.

“I taught a couple of classes that were pretty instrumental in helping develop ideas,” she said. “One of them was GEP 101. I taught that with the goal of getting feedback from students about what they care about and what issues they find to be important.”

During that same semester, she also taught a special topics class with a social justice theme called Action Anthropology. She was pleasantly surprised when 18 students enrolled. “That was a nice full class and quite varied in background, race and ethnicity and areas of study,” she said.

In all her classes that semester, Walker-Pacheco held informal focus groups to learn more about student voting.

Three-hour meeting launches Paws

Inspired by her students’ enthusiastic response, Walker-Pacheco decided it might be worthwhile to take voter education and engagement beyond the classroom.

She invited students, many from the Action Anthropology class, to meet in February 2020. Fourteen students attended, which more than met her expectations.

“We had a three-hour meeting that first time, and it did not even involve pizza or anything,” Walker-Pacheco laughed. The meeting carried its own momentum, buoyed by a group of “passionate” students who were “full of ideas and dreams of what we could do.”

That first meeting was memorable for Wertz, too. “I knew Paws was an organizing home for me because I felt like my voice mattered,” she explained. “I felt like I truly had a say in the short-term and long-term values and mission of the initiative.”

A mission and a name

The group eagerly agreed to meet again. Wertz even suggested that Paws should meet weekly, according to Walker-Pacheco. “This is important,” Wertz had told her.

At the second meeting, the group began developing a mission statement. They also needed a name.

Walker-Pacheco came up with Paws to the Polls. “We were throwing names out, and I’d said ‘MSU votes’ or ‘Bears vote’ or something like that,” she said. “Then all of a sudden I just said, ‘Paws to the Polls,’ referring of course to bear paws. And that’s it.”

Student-driven campus initiative

Many in the campus community assume Paws is a student club organization. Walker-Pacheco wants to dispel that perception.

“We’re an initiative, a voter education initiative that is student-driven,” she said, adding that its activities extend beyond those of a club and carry a great deal of responsibility.

Because Paws empowers students, it has drawn a diverse range of academic majors over the past five years. Whereas in 2020 Paws was composed mostly of sociology and anthropology students, it now includes political science, art and design, planning, disability studies, education, communications, languages and individualized majors.

“I know Paws thrives because it listens to students, trusts their leadership and decisions and invests in their growth,” Wertz said.

Stevens holds similar views. “When students see their peers taking initiative, asking questions, and getting involved, it sends a powerful message that their voices matter,” he said.

Prioritizing voter education

Guided by their mission to create a voting culture on campus, the group developed a list of action items. Topping the list: developing a voting curriculum for the GEP classes and producing a voter education guide.

Their voting curriculum is now a regular, although optional, part of Missouri State’s First Year Foundation classes. Paws members visit the classes, distribute guides, pens and stickers and, if permitted, give a brief presentation.

New public affairs certificate

Meanwhile, Walker-Pacheco recently developed a public affairs certificate at Missouri State. The program includes a new, one-credit core class, Exploring Public Affairs, which she taught as a pilot section in Spring 2025.

“Over the past few years, I’ve talked to dozens of people across campus at all levels, including deans, department heads and school directors,” she said. “I’ve got overwhelming support for the idea of this being taught more broadly.”

Community education and outreach efforts

Another of Paws’ successful outreach efforts is their local election voter guides. Now, Paws regularly distributes both printed and digital versions of the guides to the campus and Springfield communities.

Wertz came up with the idea for Paws to create and distribute their own guides.

“We were talking about a local election, and Liz said something about the League of Women Voters’ guide and I said, ‘Oh, they only have them for major elections, every two years in November,’” Walker-Pacheco recalled. “And she said, ‘We should make our own.’ And I was like, ‘That’s a great idea!’”

Building on their success, Paws members extended their outreach efforts to the Springfield community. They formed educational partnerships with the Springfield chapters of the League of Women Voters and the NAACP, Springfield’s Neighborhood Advisory Council, Leadership Springfield and — most recently — the Springfield Daily Citizen. One result of those collaborative efforts is Paws’ local high school voter education activities.

Another successful effort has been to bring local candidates and speakers to campus. According to Walker-Pacheco, Stevens played a key role in making this happen. “He really wanted to involve more local elected officials. Some of those meet and greets and things like that — that was his initiative.”

Developing a lifelong commitment to civic engagement

Walker Pacheco noted that many Paws members go on to enjoy successful careers and volunteer activities. “That’s one of the most important things about Paws: it establishes pretty much a lifelong commitment to civic engagement.”

For her, the most rewarding aspect of Paws is observing how students grow in confidence and civic knowledge. She especially enjoys seeing them participate in information panels. “They always do such a phenomenal job on these panels. Watching them up there, that’s hugely rewarding.”

Looking to the future

Paws still has unmet goals. Most importantly, Walker-Pacheco hopes to form a permanent place for Paws within the structure of the university. One solution would be to develop a civic engagement center on campus to give these efforts an institutional and a physical place.

“The university has to realize, hey, this is important,” Walker-Pacheco said. “If this goes away, it will not be a good thing.”

Wertz and Stevens agree.

“I see Paws as a blueprint for other universities across the country, truly paving the way for students to take ownership of their power and organize,” Wertz said.

“Missouri State has a unique opportunity to model what civic leadership looks like, and Paws is a big part of that,” Stevens agreed.

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Photos provided by Suzanne Walker-Pacheco unless where otherwise indicated.