A group that collects data on voter registration trends released numbers showing an increase in young people registering to vote in Pennsylvania, and the firm’s Butler County figures match the state’s trend.

TargetSmart released seven months of nationwide data using the Feb. 14 Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Fla., as a center point. Young people appear to be registering to vote in greater numbers, the organization posits.

A report on the group’s findings written by its CEO, Tom Bonier, pointed out Pennsylvania’s results, saying the Keystone state “saw youth voter registration surge by over 16 points after Feb. 14, jumping from 45.2 percent to 61.4 percent of new registrants.”

TargetSmart provided county-specific data to the Eagle.

Butler County had 580 people register to vote in the time preceding the shooting and 836 people register in the period after the shooting.

There are 126,151 registered voters in Butler County, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State.

People ages 18 to 29 made up 46 percent of those new registrants before the shooting, but 69 percent after, according to TargetSmart. Older age groups saw shrinking shares of new voters in Butler County after the tragedy.

Michael Coulter, a political-science professor at Grove City College, said the seven months of data likely wasn’t enough to make any real takeaways from the sample.

“It’s too little data to make any kind of judgment on,” Coulter said. “Other factors, such as annual end-of-the-school year voter registration drives, could skew things.”

Comparing those numbers over a longer span of time would better prove a surge in young registrants, Coulter said. TargetSmart may have done that, he said, but the released data is only seven months worth of newly-registered voters.

If there is a registration trend, he said, it may be better explained by a series of events energizing young, mostly liberal voters, rather than the solitary shooting.

Nine counties in Western Pennsylvania hold true to the statewide average with an average increase of 16 percentage points after the shooting among voters under 29.

Allegheny County had 4,432 voters register before the shooting and 5,487 after. Before the shooting, voters under 29 made up 49.8 percent of new voters. After the incident, those younger voters made up 63.8 percent of newly registered voters.