Newark’s teen voters were eager to cast a ballot. But they had to fight to actually participate.

“Sign up for Chalkbeat Newark’s free newsletter to get the latest news about the city’s public school system delivered to your inbox. Teenager Fatoumata Bah joined her peers on Tuesday to vote in the Newark school board election, where the city’s 16- and 17-year-olds could participate for a second year in a row. What the 17-year-old didn’t expect was how much time and effort it would actually take to vote. “I thought I was at the right location, but I was told that I wasn’t. And then when I was finally at the right place to vote, the machine jammed when I tried to scan my ballot,” said Bah, a senior at Science Park High School. Meanwhile, 16-year-old Cidell Torto was told by a poll worker that she was too young to vote. “She literally told me you’re 16, you can’t vote,” said Torto, a junior at Science Park, who had to have an adult intervene to vouch for her voting right. As Bah and Torto tried to cast their ballots on Tuesday, they were met with confusion at polling sites, questions about their voting eligibility, and jammed machines. The two teens, along with their Youth Power Action Coalition peers, had been busy knocking on roughly 3,000 doors in the lead up to the Newark Board of Education election to inform their community about the upcoming race –– but they hadn’t counted on encountering those barriers. A Science Park High School junior holds her "I Voted" sticker after voting for the first in the Newark school board election. The youth coalition of more than 200 Newark students spent weeks raising awareness about the election, getting their peers registered, organizing a civic engagement event for teens , learning and educating other youth about the role of school board members, and hosting virtual civic workshops to engage young voters. The teens had previously urged board members to work with them and proposed increasing student oversight over policies around mental health and school facilities. But the school board rejected their proposals in February . The mayoral-backed Moving Newark Schools Forward slate appeared headed to victory on election night . The slate, made up of current board President Hasani Council and his running mates Quamid Childs, Mark Comesañas, and Jordy Nivar this year, has won every election since 2016. Their win would mark the second year the nine-member Newark school board is made up entirely of candidates who ran under the slate. Less than 3% of the city’s registered voters participated in the Tuesday election as of April 21 , according to unofficial results posted online that do not include provisional ballots. Two years ago, city leaders celebrated making Newark the first city in New Jersey to lower the voting age for school board elections. But when it came to welcoming young voters like Bah and Torto to the polls on Tuesday, that energy didn’t last long. After a high-profile push to register 16- and 17-year-old voters last year, teen registration has dropped, with 1,524 signed up this year – down from last year’s 1,772 in 2025, according to the Essex County Superintendent of Elections on Tuesday. Newark Public Schools also launched a Vote 15+ campaign last year, the first time teens could vote, to register student voters and hosted state and city officials to encourage teen participation. This year, state, city, and district officials made no visible effort to register teen voters or promote youth participation. Buses parked outside Bethany Baptist Church to take Newark’s 16- and 17-year-olds to their polling site on April 21, 2026 in Newark, N.J. “There is just so much that people don’t see about getting youth to the polls,” said Amanda Ebokosia, founder and CEO of The Gem Project, a nonprofit organization that aims to strengthen youth civic engagement. She, along with student leaders, organized a “Ride to the Polls” event on Tuesday to ensure young voters had transportation to get to their voting site. That effort in itself took days to coordinate, as they had to get parental consent for students to ride buses and ensure students were fed and knew what to expect in the voting process. The group of roughly 20 students that participated in “Ride to the Polls” dealt with other challenges at voting sites, such as teens having a hard time obtaining provisional ballots and dealing with poll workers who were misinformed about the youth vote, Ebokosia said. Ebokosia said she was thankful for the adult volunteers who tagged along to help teens vote since they were able to advocate for them. She said at least one teen in her group did not receive a ballot ahead of the April 21 election. Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org .

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