10-year-old Geno had an Election Day message, and to tell it, he put it down in red marker on a sheet of construction paper that he rolled into a megaphone, as something he wanted to shout.

“Speak up,” it read. “Stand up, for each other!”

The J. A. Rogers Elementary School fifth grader in Kansas City, Mo., joined students all across LINC’s more than 40 morning and after-school programs in preparing for the Nov. 3 election with their own creations of ballot boxes, issues and campaigns.

And what was most moving, said Diamond Nolan, the LINC Caring Communities Coordinator at Rogers, was that when Geno and many of his classmates talked about ways to inspire voting, they were thinking beyond themselves.

Too often, Diamond said, “they have issues, but they feel they’re always being told what to do. They feel like their opinions don’t matter.”

But LINC’s mission was to help youth find power in their voice now, and to turn their eyes toward the election days ahead of them. And there was Geno, with his message, and classmates like De’Vante, a 9-year-old fourth grader with a megaphone inscribed “Talk louder,” telling Diamond they were thinking about kids needing to be able to stand up against bullying.

“They saw voting not just a way to get their point across,” she said, “but that it can make change and help somebody else.”

Kids take these voting messages home and into households in neighborhoods around many of LINC’s sites that have historically been under-represented in the vote counts, said LINC Caring Communities Director Brenda Newsome.

All of LINC’s Caring Communities programs have site councils that bring community stakeholders together to rally around issues important to them and empower their voice. Election Day is a critical part of a community’s rise, and LINC’s site teams worked with schools and parents to spread the word.

LINC created voter pledge cards, Newsome said, that sites gave to parents and neighbors to urge a commitment and plan to vote. They could even request an email, call or text reminder to vote.

Watch: High school seniors register to vote

And LINC is keeping its after-school program open 90 minutes later — to 7:30 p.m. — on election night to give parents time to vote before picking up children.

“We want parents to share that voting experience with their kids,” Newsome said. And, for parents who might have felt too busy or unready to vote, “the kids can encourage their parents to get out (and vote).”

It’s exciting to see children getting such hands-on experience in elections, said Rasheedah Villarreal, a parent of two LINC children at Holliday Montessori School in the Kansas City Public Schools.

When Villarreal picked up her children the week before Election Day, her kindergartner, Charis, was wearing a paper medallion she’d colored and signed with a star in the middle and the words “Future Voter” circling the top.

“Did you vote today?” Villarreal asked her daughter.

Everyone, she found out, was voting on different things or engaged in different ways, varying to their grade level. Fifth graders, like her son, Chase, were voting on future activities the class could do, like a movie night or a game night. Second graders watched a video introducing young children to ideas like candidates, issues and amendments.

For Villarreal, it was a poignant moment with her daughter, with the mother knowing that women and Black Americans are weighted by a history of voter suppression.

“A lot of people don’t see the power in voting,” Villarreal said. “I want her to know it’s important. That our votes do count. She’s going to understand that her ability to vote is her right and she should do it.”

The bright red and blue voting booths the children built are still up at Holliday, said LINC Caring Communities Coordinator Sheronda Luckado, because some children missed the original voting day and didn’t want to be left out.

“Some are excited now about going with their parents to vote,” Luckado said. “They’re the future of the world. They’re learning that their words and their voices matter. They have a say-so.”

The education campaign with children and their families follows on LINC’s efforts with partner school districts to reach out to high school seniors who are old enough to vote and help them get registered. And then, Election Day, LINC is providing buses and working with the high schools to get registered high school voters to the polls.

The impact will go beyond one Election Day, said LINC President and CEO Janet Miles-Bartee.

“When young people vote early, they tend to keep voting,” she said. “We want this to be the first of many elections for every one of these seniors.”

And for those who aren’t old enough yet, Geno, De’Vante, Charis and so many more of the freshly enthused LINC students would tell you — some with megaphones — that their day is coming.