With polls closing today, nearly 500 elementary, middle and high schools throughout Virginia and New Jersey have participated in a mock gubernatorial election sponsored by the University's Center for Governmental Studies' Youth Leadership Initiative program.
As of yesterday, over 14,000 students voted in the mock election. The results will be announced this afternoon at the General Assembly building in Richmond.
"This is our fourth Internet mock election and student participation grows each year," Youth Leadership Initiative Director Ken Stroupe said. "We suspected that youth would take an interest in politics if someone made it interesting."
A few mock elections resembled the real gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey with similar paper ballots and registration. But in most schools voting took place over the Internet.
"The main goal of the election was for the students to build a sense of responsibility as active citizens, and not to just be informed but to know the campaign issues," said Judy Cutright, a gifted resource teacher at Jackson P. Burley Middle School in Charlottesville. Students at Burley participated in their own mock election over the Internet on Monday.
According to Cutright, the students "totally ran the election," by making posters advertising the candidates positions, decorating the computer lab where online voting took place and designing registration cards.
Although the Youth Leadership Initiative offers teacher lesson plans and opportunities for students to meet candidates, the election is a student- run initiative, center spokesman Joshua Scott said.
"The voting was a great experience," said Alex Davis, a fourth-grade teacher at Virginia L. Murray Elementary School in Charlottesville. "The kids recognize how important it is to obtain information before voting." Fourth-grade students at Murray also voted in the online election Monday.
Before voting began, Angela Stokes, a representative of the Youth Leadership Initiative, gave an hour-long presentation on informed voting.
The Center for Governmental Studies, founded by Government and Foreign Affairs Prof. Larry J. Sabato to encourage participation in the democratic process, started the Youth Leadership Initiative as its signature project in 1998.
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