College Students Should Register and Vote
Introduction
I. Open with Impact: Who here is registered to vote? Well, most college students believe they don’t need to vote and that their votes don’t matter. A. (Use sub-points if needed) II. Thesis: Today I will persuade you that voting should be mandatory for college students, it gives us the opportunity to voice our opinion and make a decision to improve the nation. III. Connect: College student’s votes have a bigger impact since they are still young and continuing their education and will benefit them in the future. A. The college students will vote for what is right and what will help them in the future. IV. Preview: We will be looking at three main points on why college students should register to vote. A. First, we will look at the problems for college students who don’t vote. B. Second, we will discuss the causes of why college students have the trouble voting. C. Last, I will talk about several solutions that will help and make it easier for the college students to vote.
Body
I. Main Point: Let’s begin by looking at the problem, majority of the college students are not voting because their main focus is on their education. A. As a college student, they think it not a requirement to vote.
1. In 2012, 38 percent of 18-24 year olds voted, the least out of all the age demographics. The nation’s youngsters aren’t voting (Kamami, 2015). a. The students are not pressured or often not persuaded to vote, they don’t take the time out to learn about the laws and policies. B. Some college students can’t vote at their colleges, so they end up not going out to vote. 1. Several laws prohibit voting at colleges, many students have to go out of their way to a voting station to vote and end up not voting at all. a. College students are on campus from semester to semester and hours in classes, they say they don’t have the time to go out and vote. C. It is important for college students to register to vote, so laws can be passed that are beneficial for them. 1. Most of the people that vote are over 50 years old, Healthcare and treating the elderly are always the central point. When student’s loans, educational standards, and
Lane Community College has an opportunity to promote voting in Oregon when approximately a quarter of eligible folks in the state are unregistered. By adding a voter registration function to Lane Community College registrations, physical places to pick up voter registration cards, and providing links to official Oregon state voting information LCC will support students. And, not only will more students participate in elections throughout the state, they will also have funds and time reallocated to campus-specific campaigns that were previously spent on student organization voter registration efforts.
Rhetorical Analysis: The primary audience for this paper includes every citizen aged eighteen and above eligible to vote in the United States. The proposed topic mostly concerns these individuals due to the fact, they are affected by presidential voting institutions. Throughout this paper, I will be arguing in favor of the Electoral College, with an end goal of persuading my audience of the benefits of the system.
Hypothesis 1: Voters with higher education (which generally results in higher household incomes) are more likely to vote.
They further argue that in the age of democracy, the Presidential vote should be done by the general public, which is by direct popular vote rather than a selection of electors who subscribe to political party interests and loyalties (Harvard Law 2530). However, the foundation principles of the Electoral College were primarily to avoid chaos and confusion after national polls, to establish a balance between the State’s and the people’s interests, equal representation of rural or marginalized States and the full realization of voting as a fundamental right. Nevertheless, when analyzing the 12th Amendment in the Constitution with the role of Political Parties, the Electoral College is seen not to fully represent the majority interests of the U.S
It seems as though the younger population of voters have all grown up in a world where they have been influenced to believe that their one vote will not make a difference, and therefore they do not bother to take the time out of their busy schedules to cast their meaningless vote. In the last presidential election, only one out of four citizens between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four casted their vote (“Is the System broken?”). The opinion that one vote will not make a difference appears to be directly respondent to the younger generation of voters. This generation needs to be educated on the difference that one vote can make.
Being able to cast my first vote in the 21st century is a privilege. My generation needs to accept their patriotic responsibility and vote because many reforms are needed in order to carry us into the new millennium. Voting reforms are necessary to inspire political participation for other modifications and adjustments needed in areas such as health care, education, and Social Security, all which we as young people will face in the future. Participation in elections is necessary to facilitate and enable progress, but our present day system of voting is expiring by frustrated Americans.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of people between the ages of 18 and 24 that have voted in presidential elections are steadily lower than any other age group (Johnston). What is it about the college age group that has lead to a decrease in their involvement of elections? For Orange is the New Black actress Natasha Lyonne, 37 years old, she is drawn to the polls because of the issue of prison reform (Johnston). This is only one of many examples of the older generation having a personal connection to an issue that drives them to research candidates, fill out the registration forms, and vote. It is because of the college students’ lack of a connection to the issues addressed in elections that has led to low voting rates. To resolve this predicament, a class should be institutionalized at all colleges. For example, there is a class called GOA currently at Xavier University and it is mandatory for all first-year students. It informs students about topics that are not taught in school.
b. Many say the problem with parents teaching their student with no credentials are proven wrong
Political inactivity on the part of young Americans stems from one fundamental source -- a general cynicism of the American political process. This disdain for politics is further perpetuated by a lack of voter education and a needlessly archaic voting procedure that creates barriers to voting where they need not exist. While many of these existing problems can be rectified with relative ease through the implementation of programs such as Internet voting and better voter education, such programs create only a partial solution.
Voting plays an important role in the modern lives that can easily shape the whole world. While some people believe that voting should be voluntary, I believe that voting should be mandatory for more social benefits. This essay will discuss the reasons why voting should be compulsory.
Voting has not always been as easy as it is today. It is interesting to examine how far America has progressed in its process of allowing different types of people to be able to vote. Voting was once aimed at a particular group of people, which were white males that owned their own property. Today, most people over the age of eighteen can vote, except for the mentally incompetent or people who have been convicted of major felonies in some states. The decline of voter participation has always been a debate in the public arena. According to McDonald and Popkin, it is “the most important, most familiar, most analyzed, and most conjectured trend in recent American political history (2001, 963)” The question is, how important is voter
A.2. Gather friends to contact their representatives because a large majority can have the issue placed on election ballots.
Although, being a teenager myself I do have a clear understanding about the momentous moment certian teeangers in the Montgomery County are being offered, but was it worth the controversy within the government to finally make it happen. A Fred Schultz, elaborated on the issue that the outcome would not be as rewarding for the amount of time that was spent to grant this right to the counties teenagers in order to raise the amount of political participation(Shin). Once the results came trickling in, there seemed to still be an exceedingly low rate for voter turnouts. Montgomery teenagers were simply granted the right, and proved to the county there was no point in doing so since there was little participation from their age group. Not to mention that majority of the sampled teenagers would not take the initiative to register to vote, and even though the county had registration at the Motor Vehicle Registration there is a point that not every teeanger is able to drive legally. Thus, that extra step to increase voter registration amongst teenagers was not beneficial. Giving us the right to vote comes at a cost, and it seems
Younger people ages 18 – 24 have been less likely to vote in the past due to lack of interest, money, or time to go. Also, they just had a lack of information so they just didn’t care to have
1. Only 21 percent of the voting eligible population in 2014 were young adults ages 18-29 (“why student voters matter”, 2016).