an online tool<\/a> for voter registration in 2014.<\/p>\nThe site has grown quickly since that initial release, as more than 200 people have registered with the site to begin placing calls. Users can connect their Facebook accounts to the site as well, and can share their action with friends. Friends who are also members of the site can \u201ccheer\u201d a friend\u2019s action (the equivalent of a \u201clike\u201d on Facebook) to support and encourage the calls.<\/p>\n
There are more than 40 scripts available for people to read from as they place calls, making it as easy as possible to speak about an issue over the phone. So far, the most popular issue on the site has been the American Health Care Act proposed by Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. Kurland said dozens of people used CallToWin to ask elected officials to vote against the act.<\/p>\n
Kurland is a senior at Stanford University, studying economics. Mell is a junior at Washington University in St. Louis, studying mathematics. Neither of them are technological experts, but they have hopes of developing a mobile app for both iPhone\/iOS and Android. They might end up having some help, Kurland said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re actually talking with some other folks right now who have a background in iOS development,\u201d Kurland said, \u201chere at Stanford and a couple people from D.C. who reached out and who are interested in the tool and the project in general. We\u2019re excited to have them on board.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kurland and Mell hope the site keeps growing, but aren\u2019t interested in personal gain.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not counting on this as a steady stream of income,\u201d Kurland said. \u201cWe really just saw this as a tool that ought to exist and could help folks who are interested in engaging on these issues and being more impactful.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\n
\u2022 Contact reporter Alex McCarthy at alex.mccarthy@juneauempire.com or 523-2271.<\/b><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said in January that phone calls from constituents were a major reason why she voted against President Donald Trump\u2019s nomination of Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education, two Juneau-Douglas High School graduates were listening. Sam Kurland and Stephen Mell, recent graduates currently in college, had already been discussing ways to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":428,"featured_media":30997,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[75],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-30996","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/428"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30996\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30996"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=30996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}