DES MOINES (AP) — Since Iowa City teenager Caroline Found died in a mo-ped crash nearly two years ago, a group of her friends have been campaigning to change state law so that underage mo-ped drivers are required to wear helmets — an effort that last week again failed to advance in the Senate.

While Leah Murray, 18, Olivia Lofgren, 19, and Caroline Van Voorhis, 18, described themselves as undeterred, their experience has been a political education in the often slow process of getting legislation passed, which can require grassroots organizing, public education campaigns, befriending legislators and years of work.

“Politics are not how the textbooks describe it. You need connections, you need to know people. It definitely is who you know compared to what you know sometimes,” said Murray, a freshman at Hope College in Michigan.