Commentary: Remove obstacles to student vote
Bard College President Leon Botstein and senior Sadia Saba enter the new voting site at the Bertelsmann Campus Center on Election Day 2020. Photo credit: Karl Rabe
College should be the most transformative years in a student’s life. But now, in addition to mastering remote learning in the midst of a global pandemic, students have had to try to figure out how to make their ballots count this fall.
Evidence has shown that while young voters historically vote at lower rates, their interest in voting has grown overwhelmingly in the last several years. Youth voting grew significantly during the 2018 midterms and in this year’s election, early voting suggests that there appears to be record youth voting, through it will still lag behind other age groups.
However, even without a global pandemic, voting as a college student can be tough. Every November, a significant portion of our state’s population is excluded from voting simply because they live too far away from their polling site. Poll sites are often too inaccessible or too far from campus with limited public transportation to get there. According to a survey by Tufts University’s Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning, nearly 20 percent of youth with college experience cited a lack of transportation as a reason for not voting in 2016.
Post Date: 11-04-2020