After roughly a year of encouraging Newark teens to register and vote in this spring's school board race, the enthusiasm appeared to wear off by Election Day.

Out of more than 1800 newly eligible 16 and 17 year olds who registered, just 3.8% cast a ballot.

Now, voter turnout for Newark school elections is historically low and turn out for voters of all ages was lower, just 3.2%.

Organizers pushing to lower the voting age elsewhere are calling Newark's case a strong start for the movement.

While critics say they can't get behind more money being spent on a statewide push.

So where does it all go from here?

I'm joined by our education and child welfare writer Hannah Gross So, Hannah, let's just start with the numbers here, because, of course, Newark teens earned the right to vote in this race a year ago.

To be able to have a say and they didn't really turn out, depending on how you look at it.

What's up with that?

I mean, it's hard because April school board elections always have low turnouts.

And that was the same for the 16 and 17 year old as it was for the general population.

I think with all of the energy, excitement and momentum, advocates were hoping to have more of a turnout and really show that young people are here and want to have their voices heard in these elections.

But as with other voting changes, it might take some time for popularity to grow.

Yeah, I mean, certainly I've seen the argument made that early voting was not necessarily adopted by everyone right away, and that took some time for it to build up.

And now look at it.

But were they expecting more?

There's 1800 newly registered teens is still a nice number for them.

But were they expecting more?

I imagine so.

Advocates weren't giving an exact number of what they were hoping for.

I know the superintendent in the school district said he was hoping 3000 students would register and they got around 1800, as you said.

So they didn't meet that registration goal.

And that made it harder to get a higher number of voters.

Yeah, And I do wonder, had this been in a district where they hold their school board elections in November, which many districts have moved to do, if that would have changed things?

What does it mean for the statewide push?

I mean, what are the advocates telling you about their efforts?

Are they going to scale back, move forward?

It depends who you talk to, what it means for the statewide push, critics will say.

Newark didn't go well.

We shouldn't spend money on this.

And advocates will say they turned out higher than the general population.

This is a worthwhile cause, a worthwhile investment.

Towns can still do this on their own.

They don't need the state to act on it.

This is normally done at the municipal level based on local rules so other towns can follow suit if they choose to.

It's just up to state lawmakers and the governor.

If there will be additional money in the budget to help get the word out and train poll workers in towns that do approve a measure.

To have voter registration drives like we saw in Newark, big assemblies at some of the high schools.

I mean, clearly, as you reported, you know, any civic engagement is good engagement.

Is there more of a likelihood here and an argument to be made that now they're on the voter rolls and they're more likely to continue voting or to show up and vote in general elections when they're 18?

People I spoke to from Vote 16 USA, which is working on this nationwide, said that's been the case in other towns across the country that have lowered the voting age, especially in Maryland, which has been one of the biggest states.

They have about nine cities that have done it.

Turnout has increased year over year for young people, and it's also brought up the turnout of the general population.

So more people are going to vote at every age, which.

That was part of the case being made early on.

Right.

That to expand the voter pool, we need to expand those who are eligible.

They said it will start if you start voting at 16 or 17.

And when you're in your community where you know the people in power or with your family or with your classmates, it's much easier to become a lifelong voter and build that habit at 16 versus if you go out of state, move to a new community and have to suddenly navigate all of this on your own at 18.

Hmm.

Okay.

So behaviors are big for creating those habits.

You can read Hannah Gross's full piece on this and all the rest of her coverage on the Newark teen vote on our website NJSpotlightNews.org.

Hannah, thanks so much for coming in.

Thank you Bri.