This report is a comprehensive reference for election officials on election processes and best practices, including guidance on physical security and location management for polling places. It serves as the primary federal-level guidance on polling place operations in the absence of national layout standards.
Resources
Use our resource library to explore the latest research in the field of election science.
This Publicly available, interactive tool helps election officials and their IT teams identify, understand, and prioritize cybersecurity solutions for their election operations.
This report provides a comprehensive update to the EAC's landmark poll worker reports from 2007 and 2016, based on current data across four key areas: recruitment, training, retention, and evaluation. It captures the significantly transformed landscape of poll worker management since 2020, addressing new challenges like workforce shortages, threats against election workers, and the adoption of emerging technologies. The report also highlights state-by-state practices and emerging best practices from jurisdictions nationwide.
This report details how American voters experienced the 2024 general election. It is based on a survey of 10,200 registered voters, including 200 from each state plus D.C. Key findings from in-person voting include: over 70% of voters voted in person; mail-in voting decreased to 29% from 43% in 2020; wait times for voting were mostly short, but some disparities remained; and public schools saw a decline as polling locations, with community centers becoming the most common alternative.
This toolkit provides signage guidelines and ready-to-use templates designed for election offices of any size. They include directional signs, accessibility notices, and voter instruction materials for both inside and outside the polling location.
This publicly available interactive tool (currently in beta) allows election officials to map the layout and setup of voting equipment at an in-person polling location. Users can generate a custom, to-scale model of their space, incorporate key elements such as electrical outlets, doors, and windows, or select from common layout designs. Designs can be printed and shared with polling location leads to facilitate setup.
In this MS thesis, Fry examines the accessibility of in-person voting equipment, specifically Ballot Marking Devices (BMDs) and Direct Recording Electronics (DREs), across U.S. elections from 2000 to 2024. She uses data from Verified Voting, the U.S. Census Bureau, and BMD/DRE manufacturers to analyze trends in the deployment of accessible equipment and to evaluate current systems against VVSG 2.0 Principle 7 (the right to vote privately and independently). The author finds that although accessible equipment coverage has improved substantially since HAVA, significant gaps remain in meeting current usability and accessibility standards.
This publicly available tool allows election offices to enter the quantities of equipment, materials, and archives they have and receive an estimate of the warehouse space required to store in-person voting materials.
The 2025 Local Election Official Survey gathered insight on the views of 858 local election officials related to federal cuts to election security services, resource constraints, worries of political interference, experiences of threats and harassment, and the use of artificial intelligence in elections.
In this paper, authors utilize "policyscape" and "policy drift" as lens to conceptualize stability and change in election administration. More specifically, policy drift helps to explain a disconnect between the current service expectations from these offices and existing models of staffing and workforce development. These conclusions were reached through interviews with local election officials in Oregon.
This video highlights three areas of emerging research that can strengthen trust, communication, and professional practice in election administration. Presenters also highlight results of their recent survey examining election official needs related to ethics training and support. They also explore a new training model for local election officials.
Study investigating how to counter misinformation about voting and election fraud using a comparitive study between the United States and Brazil.