This is it.
While I write this, all of you will still be gearing up to vote or sending in your last minute absentee ballots. When you read this, the election will have come and gone, and we will all know who will serve as the next President of the United States.
If you have been keeping up with my columns, you’ll know that I began as an undecided voter who was completely uneducated about politics.
Throughout my journey, I have watched debates, researched candidates and local lawmakers, learned about the proposals and talked to other students about their views.
Before I made my decision, I decided to do one last thing for this final column written about my progress and what I’ve learned.
I took a poll and set up something similar to a mock election within one of the halls on campus. Although this was a very small portion of voters on campus, it was something I was interested in seeing.
Anyone who participated in this poll was told it was anonymous and asked only one question—who are you voting for in the 2012 election?
I offered three choices, which included Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, or Third Party. I’m not going to lie about it, either; the results surprised me (which you can find next to this column).
I also took it upon myself to try to get in touch with a representative from the organizations on campus: College Democrats, College republicans and someone who represented an independent party.
Unfortunately, I didn’t hear anything back from the College Republicans, but I did learn a lot about the goals and ideas shared by the College Democrats, as well as the mentality of an independent party supporter.
The independent party supporter gave me some interesting ideas, which I had never really considered throughout my process. I feel like my entire journey has been spent focusing on the republican and democratic parties.
It was extremely refreshing to hear something that made me stop, think and want to learn more.
With that, there were also some statements made which put the final touch on everything I’ve learned throughout my journey. Katy Walker, the representative of College Democrats, made a comment that really stuck out to me. It was something that really got me thinking, and something I really liked.
She said, “Our main goal was to get students registered to vote, no matter what party they aligned themselves with.”
Now, coming from the President of the College Democrats, you would think they want to convince as many people as they can to vote democratic, and don’t get me wrong, that is a huge priority of theirs. However, I was shocked to hear that getting people to vote, either way, is what is most important.
After I heard this, I continued to think about it. Isn’t that the main point of every political campaign? If you don’t convince people to get out and vote, how are you ever going to convince them to vote a certain way?
Throughout this journey, I have learned so much more than I ever thought I would. All in all, I’ve learned the true importance of getting out there and voting. Your voice counts for so much more than you think.