Student PIRGs

We’re America’s largest generation, and we’re working for a better future. Here’s our 2019-2020 annual report.

Preliminary reports from the Florida country registrars’ websites show an increase in voter turnout rate in student-heavy precincts. Florida PIRGs’ New Voters Project, one of the country’s oldest and largest youth-led voter mobilization efforts, ran massive get-out-the-vote volunteer actions in the final weeks leading up to the election.

Nationwide — The NAACP, the nation’s largest and most highly recognized civil rights organization, and the Student PIRGs’ New Voters Project, one of the country’s oldest and largest youth-led voter mobilization efforts, announced the last push of their youth get out the vote campaign Monday in Florida. In addition to working together, the Student PIRGs are providing the NAACP a grant to help expand the scope of the project during this crucial election.

Since the early 2000s, the Student PIRGs have centered on open textbooks as a key way to make college more affordable. Although textbooks continue to be one of the most expensive out of pocket costs for college students, textbook prices… Read more

The COVID-19 pandemic is disrupting campuses nationwide. Over the summer, instructors and support services have developed new ways to function online, in person, or with some combination of the two. Many students are wondering how this transition will affect their… Read more

OAKLAND — University of California campuses will start phasing-out single-use plastics, paving the way for campuses free of non-essential plastics by 2030, the UC Office of the President (UCOP) and CALPIRG Students announced jointly today. The new policy will transition UC away from plastic bags in retail and dining locations and eventually eliminate single-use plastic food service items and plastic bottles, helping to reduce the production of plastic pollution in California and prevent microplastics from contaminating waterways.  

John Lewis was an American hero. Most people knew him as a champion of civil rights, whether as a young man marching for freedom on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma in 1965 or serving as the “conscience of the… Read more

As you work on providing economic relief and protecting public health in response to the COVID-19 crisis and move forward with the FY21 appropriations process, we, the undersigned student advocacy organizations, write to urge you to invest in America’s institutions of higher education, so that they can ensure student success and support during this crisis.

A powerhouse lineup of artists, activists, influencers and elected officials will kick off Democracy Summer 2020 Thursday evening at a virtual event. The effort, led by Rock the Vote in partnership with the Student PIRGs, Voto Latino Foundation, When We All Vote, March For Our Lives and many more, aims to register and mobilize 200,000 new voters over the summer.

We’re spending the summer giving hundreds of young people a crash course in effective citizenship and an opportunity to help ensure the voice of their generation is heard on Election Day, by helping to reach out to their peers to… Read more