Every four years means solar eclipses, the Olympics and a leap year. But here in the United States, every four years means a bombardment of political Facebook battles, front lawn signs and random people calling your house asking for donations.
This month means that the most important race is having its quadrennial occurrence: The presidential election.
With this year’s race nearly neck-and-neck between candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, voting has become more of a necessity than an option. But with so many SCAD students hailing from out of state, making your voice heard can pose to be quite a chore.
From surveying 100 random students, however, this minor complication does not seem to be keeping students from voicing their political opinions.
Out of 100 SCAD students, 78 said that they will be voting in this year’s election, with well over half using the absentee ballot method. Voters who are living out of their registered state request ballots either via post or email, and receive them in the mail to fill out and return before a set date. The other percentage are either Georgia residents, or students who have registered in the state of Georgia.
So why the gap? Many reasons including students hailing from international territories, or not becoming registered in time could be the cause for those failing to vote this election. With many states requiring absentee ballots be turned in a week or more before election day, any slack in postal delivery could prose serious time constraints. Student voting can also be a pain for those trying to register out of their home state.
With the youths taking a strong stance at many civic issues such as gay and reproductive rights, it is apparent that college-aged citizens are an important influence on the political outcome.
Whether this outcome is red or blue or neither, is up to the public, but voting is an important right that many demographics fought to have. So with a disregard to your support of our current president or favor of a new one, make sure that come the closing of the polls your ballot has been cast. Because if you didn’t vote and are upset by tonight’s outcome, you don’t get to complain for four years.
