Now that election season is upon us, the American Democracy Project, as well as the Center for Civic Leadership, have taken action educate students about their options.
Vivian Agnew, FHSU student with the American Democracy Project says that they are “committed to helping the FHSU community become active and engaged citizens. An enormous part of that engagement process, especially in the context of government and democracy, is getting students and community members registered to vote.” In September, the American Democracy Project partnered with Fort Hays State University’s Student Government Association to register about 300 students through an online tool called Turbo Vote.
Many students don’t register to vote because they don’t think their vote will matter, or they simply don’t feel the need to. Students Emily Leiker and Anna Gerber shared their views on the importance of voting.
Leiker, Junior at FHSU says, “I think it’s important for college kids to vote because we need to be represented too. The decisions that a future leader makes will affect us a lot, so we want someone who has our best interests in mind too.” Sophomore Gerber, says, “I think it’s important to vote; if everyone thinks their vote doesn’t count we’d never make any decisions in our country.”
Agnew says that they were incredibly happy with the success registering students in September and mentioned that they plan to do another push in the spring 2016 semester before the Kansas primary elections.
Over the past week, the American Democracy Project hosted mock elections during the day in the Memorial Union. Students logged in to TigerLink and were able to vote on their top candidate for the presidential election. Next week they will be posting the results for students to see, and raise awareness about the candidates and what they stand for, as well as raising awareness for the election process in general.
As election season creeps up on us, remember what Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “Nobody will ever deprive the American people of the right to vote, except the American people themselves and the only way they could do this is by not voting.”
If you didn’t get the chance to stop by the Memorial Union in September to register but still want to, visit fhsu.turbovote.org to sign up.