Why vote at school

Why register to vote where you attend school?

Many young people first register to vote from the address of their parents, their guardians, or another previous address. But you may also apply to vote where you attend school and will live most of the year. Consider?.

You probably won't have November 2nd off to drive somewhere else to vote.

Regrettably, very few schools cancel classes on Election Day so that students can drive or fly to a prior address and cast their ballots. You can file absentee, if you file early and provided you do not live in one of the many states - including Illinois, Michigan, Louisiana, Nevada, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia - that prohibit first time voters from voting by absentee ballot. If you maintain a prior registration address and are unable to file absentee, you will be left the awkward choice to either skip class and pay your way to the polls, or risk losing the chance to cast a ballot at all.

Local politics affect your social life, your finances, and your education.

As a full-time student, you will be subject to the housing regulations, noise ordinances, police authority, and even some of the taxes enacted by your local government. If you do not register to vote where you attend school, you are surrendering one of the tools available to you to influence these policies.

You have an interest in the choices of your mayor, city council and local commissions concerning planning and development, concerning the maintenance of parks and recreational space, and certainly concerning the division of authority between the town and your university. You have an interest in laws regulating the wages you can earn as an employee and in policies affecting which shops and businesses will choose to locate in your community. You have an interest in the availability of affordable housing close to campus. If yours is a public university, you have an interest in the tuition rates set by your state government.

You have the power to shape the politics of your college town.

As a full-time university student, studying within a dynamic community of ideas, you are uniquely positioned to shape the politics of the place where you live. You have time, idealism, creativity, energy?.and several thousand friends to rally to the cause. In many college towns, university students represent a plurality, if not an outright majority, of the local population. And in a democracy, majority rules.

This is precisely why some people in your college town might not want you or your fellow students to vote. And this discriminatory discouragement from voting locally, sometimes taking the form of procedural barriers or intimidation, illustrates precisely why it is important that you exercise your power to vote.

If you practice the craft of citizenship now, you will be better prepared and further empowered to stand up for your rights and your beliefs in years ahead. If you are prevented from exercising your rights of citizenship be sure to report your story at www.rockthevote.com/campusvote.