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" WORK THE PHONES Time commitment: As much as you can give; before or on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you love to talk, even to strangers, about your specific cause or candidate. &amp;quot;Phone banks are formed wherever a candidate&amp;#039;s campaign or an organization can bring volunteers together \u2014 at an office after hours, in someone&amp;#039;s home, or at a church,&amp;quot; says Rene Redwood, affiliate of the National Council of Women&amp;#039;s Organizations. &amp;quot;The idea is to get the word out to people to remember to vote. You&amp;#039;re also encouraged to call up your friends, family, and neighbors.&amp;quot;  WAVE A SIGN Time commitment: As much as you can give; before or on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you&amp;#039;ve got a cheerleader attitude and you don&amp;#039;t mind a little rainy weather. &amp;quot;As a volunteer, you might stand at a high- traffic intersection during rush hour so that people can see your candidate&amp;#039;s name one more time before heading to the polls,&amp;quot; says Melody Drnach, vice president of the National Organization for Women. &amp;quot;Holding up a sign in public is all about increasing the visibility of your preferred candidate.&amp;quot;  REGISTER OTHER CITIZENS TO VOTE Time commitment: As much as you can give; before Election Day.Ideal for you if... you don&amp;#039;t have a specific agenda and you&amp;#039;re comfortable talking to and helping people of all ages and backgrounds. &amp;quot;For this position, you stand at a booth on a street corner or at an event and you approach people and ask them if they&amp;#039;re registered to vote,&amp;quot; says Kelly Keenan Trumpbour, associate director of Running Start. &amp;quot;Then, you provide information about where to register or you give them the necessary forms and help them fill them out right then and there.&amp;quot; KNOCK ON DOORS Time commitment: Two to three hours of training, then multiple shifts of several hours each; before Election Day.Ideal for you if... you&amp;#039;re a natural-born salesperson who feels passionate about a specific issue or candidate.  &amp;quot;Door-knocking is a sales job,&amp;quot; says Keenan Trumpbour. &amp;quot;You deliver your pitch and try to get someone to reconsider their vote. It&amp;#039;s fun and challenging!&amp;quot; If you&amp;#039;re knocking on behalf of a specific candidate or organization, you&amp;#039;ll attend training sessions to learn the candidate&amp;#039;s platform, what the citizens of the community care about, and how the candidate will address their concerns. Adds Clare Giesen, executive director of National Women&amp;#039;s Political Caucus, &amp;quot;People appreciate the fact that you&amp;#039;ve taken time away from other commitments and that you might even be dragging your kids around with you, so that one-on-one conversation can really convince them to get to the polls.&amp;quot;  CHAUFFEUR VOTERS TO THE POLLS Time commitment: As much as you can give; before or on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you own a car and can have a friendly chat without talking partisan politics. &amp;quot;Volunteers are needed to transport senior citizens to and from the polling places because they often don&amp;#039;t have rides, and polling places aren&amp;#039;t always along bus routes,&amp;quot; says Mary Wilson, president of the League of Women Voters. And in states that offer early voting, you can also volunteer to drive before Election Day: &amp;quot;Campaigns can provide you with lists of those people who are likely to vote early, and you can contact them to find out if they need transportation,&amp;quot; says Giesen. &amp;quot;You can also go to nursing homes and do a presentation about how to go about voting early, and then offer your services as a driver.&amp;quot;  WORK THE POLLS Time commitment: Several hours of training, plus a full-day shift on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you&amp;#039;re approachable, patient, and don&amp;#039;t mind explaining procedures over and over again. &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;ll be in charge of making sure elections run smoothly at a specific polling place \u2014 setting up voting equipment, greeting and signing in voters, verifying their registrations, and offering assistance with voting booths,&amp;quot; says Keenan Trumpbour. &amp;quot;In some cases, you&amp;#039;ll be compensated \u2014 at around minimum wage \u2014 by your state&amp;#039;s Board of Elections; call and ask if the position is paid or volunteer in your state.&amp;quot;  WATCH THE POLLS Time commitment: Several hours of training, plus a half-day shift on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you have loyalty to a specific candidate and excellent attention to detail. &amp;quot;A poll watcher works on behalf of a candidate to monitor the voting process and make sure voters are having a positive, legal experience,&amp;quot; says Faith Winter, national field director of the White House Project. The job entails observing everything from the setting up of voting machines to the tallying of votes, and reporting any conduct that seems fraudulent. Also, says Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Politics and Women, &amp;quot;your candidate might provide you with a list of voters who support him or her, and you keep track of who hasn&amp;#039;t voted yet; then you call them up to remind them to vote.&amp;quot; BABYSIT Time commitment: However long it takes your friend, neighbor, or sister to get to the polls and back on Election Day.Ideal for you if... you enjoy spending time with children \u2014 including other people&amp;#039;s!  &amp;quot;If a few of you are all moms, get together and switch off watching everyone&amp;#039;s kids while the others head to the polls,&amp;quot; suggests Mary McClelland, deputy political director for field operations of Rock the Vote. If that idea won&amp;#039;t work for you, there&amp;#039;s help: &amp;quot;Register with your local YWCA,&amp;quot; says Sarah Albert, YWCA director of social policy and advocacy. &amp;quot;We&amp;#039;re the country&amp;#039;s largest child-care provider, and we&amp;#039;ve always supported democracy.&amp;quot;  HOW TO HELP OUT: To volunteer for any of these election-related activities, start by calling or emailing the campaign headquarters of your favorite candidate. Still not sure who&amp;#039;s getting your vote? No problem! Learn about nonpartisan volunteer opportunities by calling or visiting your local county clerk or Board of Elections. Or visit an advocacy group website and sign up for an email newsletter listing volunteer positions in your area. For a list of involved organizations, visit redbookmag.com/election.   MORE GET-INVOLVED IDEAS: To find women running for office in your area who need volunteers for their campaigns, go to thewhitehouseproject.org  and check out their Women Helping Women Win initiative. Got your own volunteer idea? Get support at rockthevote.com &amp;#039;s &amp;quot;Take Action&amp;quot; page, where you can gather resources and tips to bolster your efforts. &amp;quot;I volunteered as a poll worker during the primaries this year, which was so fun and fulfilling! The job required three hours of training and reading a book about my role. I took time off from work and dropped my kids off at my parents&amp;#039; place so I could commit my whole day to it: I was at the site at 5:30 a.m. to set up the polls, and I stayed until 10 p.m., delivering machines and tables back to the Registrar of Voters. I was busy the whole day helping people whose names weren&amp;#039;t on the list get set up with provisional ballots, assisting other poll workers, and making sure everything ran smoothly. It was thrilling to help people vote and to see how excited they got about participating in the democratic process.&amp;quot; - Shelli Rowley, 33, Fountain Valley, CA &amp;quot;On Election Day, I try to make myself available for any volunteer position that needs to be filled for my chosen candidate. I&amp;#039;m an attorney, so I&amp;#039;ve often stood outside the polls to answer voters&amp;#039; questions about legal procedures. I&amp;#039;ve also handed out campaign literature and engaged voters in conversation. I believe in change and the idea that if we all step up and do our part, we can really make it happen. By volunteering, I feel like I have a real impact and that I&amp;#039;m helping people express their right to vote.&amp;quot; - Felicite Moorman, 34, Oklahoma City &amp;quot;Before Election Day, I go around the community and ask the senior citizens if they&amp;#039;ll need a ride to the polls. If they do, I take down their names and the time of day that will work for them and I handle transporting them each way. The elderly want to continue participating in the democratic process just like the rest of us, so I do everything I can to help them exercise their voting rights. As part of America&amp;#039;s youth, I feel it&amp;#039;s important to connect with previous generations and let them know that we&amp;#039;re going to continue fighting to make our country great.&amp;quot; -Salandra Hanna Covener, 43, Titusville, FL &amp;quot;As a third-generation union kid, I&amp;#039;ve gone door-to-door encouraging people to vote since I was a little girl. I often hand out fliers, not to advocate a specific candidate but instead to inform people about the issues that might affect them, such as high gas prices, health care, and the war in Iraq. I&amp;#039;ve always found that people are happy to open their doors to me and hear a reminder to show up on Election Day. It&amp;#039;s a fun and easy way to volunteer!&amp;quot; - Sheena McCleery, 25, Port St. Lucie, FL  Let&amp;#039;s Get This (Political) Party Started! Back in February, REDBOOK encouraged you to throw parties to talk politics \u2014 and enjoy good food and company too, of course. (Read the article here: redbookmag.com/election.) Tons of you were inspired to get your party on \u2014 the party pics and stories rolled in! These three readers impressed us so much that we sent each of them a deluxe beauty basket. Here, they share the party gossip:  &amp;quot;I invited over friends of all political persuasions and we had a passionate discussion about the Presidential race, ate patriotic red and blue cupcakes, and then held mock elections. The race feels so personal this year \u2014 some of my guests were affected by the mortgage crisis, some are self-employed and pay for their own health insurance, and others are military vets, and all of these issues are really relevant now. I&amp;#039;m a huge John mccain fan, but, alas, in our mock elections Barack Obama prevailed. Still, the vote was very close and people kept wanting to change their votes \u2014 there was a lot of indecision. My daughter, Marina, helped me decorate for the party. And one friend dressed her toddler in a T-shirt that read, &amp;#039;Superdelegate: I can be bought,&amp;#039; so people were trying to woo him to vote for their preferred candidate. It was hilarious!&amp;quot;  -Susan Craig, 44, Mechanicsville, VA &amp;quot;My family came over for dinner and political discussion, which was certainly interesting because we run the gamut from left wing to die-hard Republican. We talked about our preferred candidates and the reasons for our picks, and the conversation stayed mostly friendly. I feel strongly that it&amp;#039;s not good for our country to have the same political party in office for too long, so I&amp;#039;m voting Democrat, and I successfully persuaded my Republican father to do the same. My stepfather has some opinions that I feel are grossly misinformed, like that Obama is a Muslim terrorist, and after some heated debate I realized there was no changing his mind, so I let it go. Other than that, the evening was really fun. I like discussing politics with people who hold views different from my own, and I think we all took something away from hearing others&amp;#039; perspectives.&amp;quot;-Jodi Fulkman, 31, Crestline, CA &amp;quot;I began my party by handing out a questionnaire that I found online that tested what political party you identified with based on how you felt about various issues. The results were fascinating because although my guests were evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, plus a couple of Independents, the quiz matched a few people with a party they weren&amp;#039;t affiliated with. I was surprised by some people&amp;#039;s reasons for their chosen party \u2014 because it was how their parents identified or because they felt their job required a certain affiliation \u2014 and we talked about how the best way to improve the country is to vote based on how you feel about the issues. We discussed immigration, the economy, and the Iraq war. The party was a real success \u2014 I think everyone left contemplating the different viewpoints and realizing that their choices have a real impact on our country.&amp;quot;  -Erica Greca, 30, Deltona, FL On November 4, every woman counts! Want to catch election fever? Log on to everywomancounts08.com to join our Every Woman Counts coalition (with Lifetime TV and Marie Claire and CosmoGIRL! magazines). "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.redbookmag.com/life/charity/a3985/hit-the-streets-voting/>