New Mexico is a swing state - maybe that's why there are more young voters registered this year.
Young voters traditionally have the lowest turnout in elections.
Less than 5 percent of undergraduate students vote in campus elections, but voter groups are hoping 50 percent of young voters will turn out for the presidential election.
"We're hoping it (apathy) is not as big a deal this year," said Sydney Henning, Young Voters Alliance campus director. "Only time will tell after November 2nd."
The alliance has focused mostly on the Get the Vote Out campaign, recruiting first-time voters. Henning said it involves a lot of going door to door, dropping off voter guides, and letting people know where to vote early.
UNM student Lucia Long said 10 people stopped by her house Tuesday, and at least seven people called.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
"That's rude," she said. "If you want us to vote, get off our ass."
This is the first election a lot of freshmen can vote in. Long said that should be reason enough to vote.
Thirty-six percent of people aged 18 to 24 voted in the 2000 presidential election, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Sen. John Kerry's campaign brought people such as Chris Heinz, Alexandra Kerry and John Cusack to campus to appeal to young voters.
The New Voters Project has registered more than 25,000 young voters in New Mexico, and about 120,000 young voters are registered throughout the state.
"All it took was asking young people to get registered, making it easy, and also talking to them about making politicians pay attention to young people," said James Moore, state director for the New Voters Project.
Moore said unless voters go out in record numbers, politicians will not address issues of interest to young people.
"There are some very serious issues that young people this year are realizing they have a stake in the election," Moore said.
He said 30 percent of young voters don't have health insurance, tuition has increased nationally by 14 percent, the unemployment rate for young people is twice the national average, and half of the casualties in Iraq were young people.
But Jesse Schwebach is a one-issue voter who doesn't care about Moore's list. He said international issues top his concerns.
Though the number of young voters may be increasing, Schwebach said the number of educated voters won't be any different.
Unless voters are researching issues instead of listening to political groups on campus, Schwebach said young voters will be given selected coverage.
Moore said politicians are slowly catching on to the needs of young voters, but there is a lot of room to seriously address them.
Although it seems young people are excited and engaged in this election, Henning said, "We're trying not to be over enthusiastic."
"We don't want to set ourselves up for a letdown," she said.
