In honor of National Voter Registration Day on Tuesday, Sept. 24, the Dickinson Votes campaign hosted a voter registration drive to encourage students to register. This is part of a greater push to maximize turnout for United States elections, specifically for the 2020 general presidential election. 

Dickinson College Republicans and United Students Searching for Rights club (USSR) ran the voter registration table at the same time, in a show of solidarity in the belief of democracy. Katie Schorr ‘21, one of the co-presidents of USSR said “the only vote that doesn’t matter is one you don’t take to the polls!” Associate Professor of Sociology Erik Love, the event organizer reflected on the event and said, “it was very exciting to see so many students, faculty and staff from all across the political and ideological spectrum work together today as they volunteered their time and energy to register members of the Dickinson community to vote locally here in Carlisle.” Love further explained that there will be more voter registration drives on Tuesday, Oct. 1 and Monday, Nov. 5.

According to research done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on voter turnout, in 2016, 58 percent of the United States population voted.  Renard Bulls ’22, an attendee of the registration drive, said “it’s a form of agency, being able to advocate for your own future. It’s cool to be able to see that I have a tangible part in the countries’ future.” Rosenberg expressed the importance of voting in response to low turnout and said,“you don’t know how lucky you are to have the freedom to see who you want elected, elected.” 

Although most students seem to be in favor of voting, Dickinson lacks a unanimous belief on the topic. When the students were asked if they would push for everyone to vote, even if it leads to an undesirable outcome in their eyes, some hesitated or declined to speak, but some responded. 

Bryce Dunio ’22, Vice President of Dickinson College Republicans, reflected on the political climate of the campus and said, “Dickinson College Republicans were well aware of [more Democrats being in PA than Republicans] when we pledged our full support for the voter registration push. Preserving our American values is more important than anything.” Vice President of Public Relations of Dickinson College Republicans, Shane Shuma ’22, reflected on the importance of voter registration and said,“the results are fair when you have a very engaged voting populace. A lot of voter registration, I still believe, helps everyone.” Schorr shared these sentiments and said, “we believe that – everyone should vote regardless of their political affiliation- the more people that vote the better.” Zahra Somji ’23 argued that everyone should vote no matter what, because “who am I to say that I am right?”