The results are in from last week’s campus mock election, with President Barack Obama winning 47 percent of the votes. Mitt Romney, the likely candidate for the Republican Party, had the second-most votes at 41 percent.
Students also wrote in candidates, with Ron Paul capturing six percent of the votes, and other miscellaneous candidates rounding off the other six percent.
The mock election, hosted by the American Democracy Project, was the second this year for the organization, but garnered more participants than the trial election earlier this year.
“The first time that we did it was sort of a run through, and this was a more official mock election,” said KAMS senior Shaley White, student coordinator for ADP. “The candidates are fewer now, so we felt like it was a more realistic.”
“The turnout was really good. … We had over 200 people. We had it in different locations and did a lot more advertising and educating. We gave away t-shirts, so they had more of an incentive,” White said.
The mock election was hosted in conjunction with ADP’s Civic Engagement week, which focused on a different subject in civic engagement for each day last week. Along with the election, ADP hosted a canned food drive, showed the documentary “Mother Earth: Caring for Seven Billion” and brought General Vic Braden on campus to speak about his experience working with the Afghan Army in southern Afghanistan.
Senior Jordan Schmeidler, project coordinator for the Center for Civic Leadership, said that he felt having a mock election on campus gave students the chance to see real democracy and civic engagement in action.
“I think having this election makes students feel like this is an obtainable type of student engagement,” Schmeidler said. “I think it was the first time for a lot of international students to experience true democracy.”
Participating in the general election in November gave students the opportunity to see their votes cast in reality. Senior Jen Verhagen, student coordinator for ADP said getting out and being civically engaged and aware of what’s going on the in world is the best way youth can get their ideas out to those who have the power to change.
“It only does something if you get out, get involved and try to make a difference. If you want your voice heard, you have to speak to the people who are going to listen and make the changes you want to see,” Verhagen said.
“Even if you don’t get your candidate chosen, one of them is bound to pay attention to the things the youth want to see done if enough people care to step up. We need to get involved and be the leaders of tomorrow and try to influence the leaders of today.”
For more information about ADP and its other activities, check out the blog at adpfhsu.org.
Recent Comments