If Tuesday's election results resemble this year's youth mock election, then the general obligation bond will overwhelmingly pass, while Democrat Meredith Richards and Republican Virgil Goode will be locked in a dead heat for the 5th District Congressional seat.
Over 67,000 students in grades K-12 nationwide participated in this year's Youth Leadership Initiative -- a program founded by Politics Prof. Larry J. Sabato in 1998.
In Virginia, roughly 20,000 students voted in the mock election.
Joshua Scott, spokesman for the University Center for Politics, said he was pleased with the number of students who participated in this year's mock election.
"This was the largest mock election that we've done," Scott said. "It is also the largest Internet mock election in the country."
Sabato founded the project in 1998 in order to encourage students to vote and take an interest in the democratic process. The program has grown quickly since then, culminating in this year's large turnout, Scott said.
Scott also said he hopes the leadership initiative attracts an even greater number of schools and students in future mock elections, especially in years of presidential elections.
In the Charlottesville-Albemarle area alone, roughly 3,300 students voted, Scott said.
In addition to voting for electoral candidates, Virginia students also weighed in on the four referenda that will appear on tomorrow's statewide ballot.
The general obligation bond "passed overwhelmingly," with over 80 percent of students voting in support of the measure, Scott said.
The two transportation referenda, which will appear on ballots in Northern Virginia and the Hampton Roads area, almost were split between support and opposition.
In Northern Virginia, 48 percent favored a half-cent addition to the sales tax, which would generate revenues for regional transportation projects, while 51 percent opposed the measure. In the Hampton Roads area, the vote was split with 50 percent in favor and 49 percent opposed.
The results for the 5th District Congressional race between Richards and Goode were close, with 48 percent supporting Richards and 50 percent supporting Goode.
Scott said tomorrow's race probably won't be that close.
"Most of the polling does not [match results of the] mock election," he said.
A majority of the student voters in the 5th District came from schools in the Charlottesville-Albemarle area, and are "probably more familiar with Meredith Richards as a Democratic candidate," than are students in other areas of the district, Scott added.
Scott said the program is not a scientific study and therefore is not representative of the voting habits of the general population.
Judy Cutright, a gifted resource teacher at Burly Middle School in Albemarle and a sponsor of the Youth Leadership Initiative, said that the program was very successful.
"We had a smooth election process in which roughly 450 students participated," she said.
Robert Dean, a government teacher at Charlottesville High School, said his school did not officially participate in the Internet survey but would be "holding elections on an individual basis in the classroom."
Sabato was enthusiastic about the success of the mock election this year.
"When this program started four years ago, we could not have imagined that it could have so quickly spread to all 50 states," he said. "We are excited that so many young people are not only voting in an Internet mock election, but are learning all semester long about the candidates and issues in their state."
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