Jahnavi Rao Email & Phone Number

United States

As President and Founder of New Voters, I ensure we register and civically engage high school students to vote, lead the New Voters Research Network, convene partner organizations in a monthly strategy call and head development for the entire organization. Throughout my time at New Voters I have directly supervised and led over 300 high school and college directors, interns and volunteers.From 2017-2022, as President I led 4 College Directors and 50+ full and part-time college and high school interns across 4 work streams. We achieved our goal of registering 50,000 high school voters by the 2020 election, trained and supported our 300+ high school chapters across the country, successfully partnered with dozens of national and local organizations, and hosted over 5 statewide registration summits.New Voters is a registered 501(c)(3) nonpartisan organization with the goal of educating and empowering the youth, and ensuring that politicians are held accountable by young voters for their legislative decisions. In 2018, as a high school club, New Voters registered over 7,000 students to vote through empowering high school students to run nonpartisan registration drives. The 501(c)(3) has now grown to over 300 chapters in 40 states across the country. The New Voter's team is comprised of 1 President, 6 Directors, and 40+ full and part-time college and high school interns.Constantly growing from partnerships with High School Democrats and Republicans of America, National Honor Society, March for Our Lives, the Women's March and other organizations, New Voters has been recognized by the PA Secretary of State and PA legislature with various awards. New Voters has been featured in The Philadelphia Inquirer (Front Page in Print and Online), the Harvard Gazette and Crimson, Ms. Magazine and NBC 10 News (Television), in addition to many other news outlets www.new-voters.org/press

Washington Dc-Baltimore Area

The New Voters Research Network (NVRN) is dedicated to better understanding the voting behavior and political socialization of high school students through rigorous youth-led political science research. We are a 12-member research group comprised of high school and college students led by Co-Directors Jahnavi Rao and Sydney Fahn.We have 6 completed research projects, 14 ongoing research projects, 4 nonprofit collaborators and 13 academic collaborators. We also ran an 8-week long summer program training 24 high school students to conduct research for impact. Recognitions: Selected as 2022 Student Vote Research Network GranteePresented research at 2023 SVRN workshopSemi-Finalist for the 2023 Innovation Under-tested Research Fund (OpenLabs, The Movement Cooperative, Everybody Votes and America Votes)Subscribe to our newsletter https://nvresearch.substack.com where we post monthly updates on our research, collaborations and opportunities.

College Park, Maryland, United States

I am a senior fellow focused on research related to understanding how high schools can more effectively welcome new voters to our democracy at the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement at the University of Maryland. As part of this, I host a regular strategy call for 30+ organizations from across the country working on high school voter registration efforts. By giving community partners space to share knowledge and launching new original research projects with them, we at CDCE plan to play a leading role in providing educators and the public with critically important knowledge about how high schools can take action to include all new voters in the 2024 elections.

The Sustainability, Transparency, Accountability Research (STAR) Lab designs and tests new ways for businesses to create positive social impacts, benefit communities and protect the environment. I am currently running a randomized control trial on the causal relationship between cause-based consumption and traditional political participation benefiting the same cause.As part of this work, I received funding to travel to and stay in Australia in Summer 2023 to conduct research and interviews with folks at the Behavioural Economics Team for the Australian Government (BETA) and the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA).

Washington, District Of Columbia, United States

- Ideated, organized, and led White House Youth Communities in Action event, bringing 40+ youth advocates to the White House to discuss youth priorities and collaboration opportunities with the Second Gentleman and various cabinet officials- Intern lead for White House Economic Impact Briefings, with 18,000+ RSVP's and attendees from all 50 states - Wrote constituency specific weekly newsletters for stakeholders across nine issue areas (Youth, Health, Faith, Latino, Women, Mental Health, LGBTQI+ and Black), consolidating relevant resources and legislation, read by over 200,000 people weekly

I founded the Boston Votes! efforts at the Harvard Votes Challenge / Institute of Politics to extend our resources to the surrounding community and empower local high school student leaders to affect change in their communities. Through New Voters and Harvard's Institute of Politics, my team and I organized a first-of-its-kind conference that brought together 15 Boston Area high schools, through student and faculty representatives, to train them on running their own voter registration, turnout, and engagement programs at their schools! Each school was assigned a Harvard student mentor to help them through the unique path for their school. The program continues as a new High School Engagement leader is chosen each year. They manage our list of over 100 schools and match interested students with an ongoing program of training facilitated by a Harvard mentor.The Harvard Votes Challenge is the first-ever university-wide, non-partisan voting campaign with reach at all 13 undergraduate and graduate schools. During the 2018/19 school year, I organized and ran a texting campaign to register students to vote, as well as ran events in conjunction with existing organizations on campus. We also launched (and won) the first-ever voting competition between Harvard and Yale. HVC is laying the groundwork to permanently institutionalize voter engagement at Harvard University.

Media, Pa

- Managed daily operations of Ciamacca State Legislative Campaign, including fundraising, canvassing, people & event organizing, digital marketing, youth engagement & voter registration, and policy research- Previously managed Communications for the Campaign (e.g., social media, monthly newsletters, fundraising outreach)

Washington Dc-Baltimore Area

- Assisted with the roll out of iwillvote.com- Coordinated national AAPI programming and pride events across the country through the DNC's networks. - Worked with College Democrats of America Chapters to implement voter registration events at college graduations.

Washington Dc-Baltimore Area

Invited by DNC Deputy Chair, Congressman Keith Ellison, to join the DNC as a National Partner. As a senior in high school, I regularly attended the National Partner meetings in DC, leading discussions on youth civic engagement and connecting with progressive organizations across the country.

United States

Supervisor Prof. Diane Mutz, Institute Chair- Conducted research and analyzed data regarding public opinion and voting trends- Co-author on piece "The Real Reason Liberals Drink Lattes," published in academic journal "Political Science and Politics;" analyzing the relationship between consumer preferences and political inclinations, specifically within globalization.- Managed the ISCAP website

Città Della Pieve, Italy, Philadelphia

- Selected to perform in the International Opera Theater’s production, Sogno, an operatic adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream, alongside professional opera artists from around the world, hailing from Russia, Singapore, Mexico, Jamaica, and beyond.- Performed as a Virtue, singing Latin hymns in the world premiere of Hildegard von Bingen: Bambina Mistica at the second most sacred papal site in the world: the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi.- Lived in Cittá della Pieve, Italy, for a month to rehearse and perform the shows- Reprised role as a Virtue in the US premiere of Hildegard von Bingen: Bambina Mistica, in sacred sites across Philadelphia.

United States

- Summer research internship on the “Effect of Stories on Imaginative Cognition for Children”- Conducted research experiments with children at the Please Touch Museum and The Academy of Natural Sciences

Bachelor'S Degree, Concentration In Government (Public Policy Track), Secondary In Music

Activities and Societies: President, Senior Advisor: South Asian Women's Collective | Director of High School Engagement, Co-Chair.

Education record

Activities and Societies: President of New Voters 501(c)(3), President of SAVES (Saving a Variety of Endangered Species) 501(c)(3).