National Teen Voter Registration Day: Leo High School in Gresham hosts session to prepare students for the November election

CHICAGO (WLS) — National Teens Voter Registration Day is a movement aimed at inspiring and mobilizing youth to participate in the democratic process.

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Leo High School in Gresham hosted registration sessions for students from six different high schools.

Get Out The Vote for Teens helped schools organize Tuesday’s event.

“This is my way of raising awareness and showing teens that their voice counts and they need to have a say,” said Letina Brady Pettis of Get Out The Vote for Teens.

Around 400 students were registered on site.

“I've been thinking about voting since 2016, just before Trump was elected,” said Derrion Anderson, a student at Leo High School. “I'm excited to finally have a say in how the election turns out.”

16- and 17-year-olds can also pre-register to vote in Illinois.

“We can go out, we can change our own future and put it in our own hands,” said Leo High School 12th grader Nicholas Armour. “That's something I don't think the youth of the past have done enough. We've allowed older generations to dictate how our country is run when in reality we're the ones who are going to live in it for 50 to 60 years, so we should be the ones taking charge.”

“We see them on the 31st Street Beach or at the occupations downtown, but we don't listen to them,” said Shaka Rawls, principal of Leo High School. “This is an opportunity for our young people to have a voice and for us to listen to them.”

Organizers urged everyone in the community to encourage young people to vote.

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In Chicago, there have been a total of 34,000 new registrations since June 1.

Most of the new registrations are young women.

New registrations are evenly distributed throughout the city, but slightly favor the North Side, Lakefront and Downtown.

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