Published: November 04, 2008 07:55 am      

Local students cast ballots

Students from several area schools participated Thursday in the democratic process as they cast their ballots in the National Student/Parent Mock Election.

More than 100,000 students in elementary, middle, and high schools across the state went to the polls to vote for their favorite candidates for president and Congress, and to voice their opinion on the most important issue facing the United States.

Across the state, the majority of students selected John McCain as the next president of the United States, and voted to send Mitch McConnell back to the U.S. Senate.

More than 300 schools participated in the election, including Berea Community Schools, Model Laboratory School, St. Mark School and Silver Creek, Waco, Mayfield and Kirksville elementary schools.

“It is essential that students become acclimated to the democratic process, and there is no better way than for them to participate in the process themselves,” said Secretary of State Trey Grayson, whose office conducted the election. “We hope that this will begin a lifelong commitment to voting among these young people.”

The John McCain/Sarah Palin ticket received 48.6 percent of the vote from students who participated in the election, while Barack Obama and Joe Biden received 47 percent of the votes. Independents Ralph Nader and Matt Gonzalez collected 3.1 percent of the vote, while Chuck Baldwin and Robert Thornsberry of the Constitution Party got 0.6 percent of the votes. Libertarians Bob Barr and Wayne Root received 0.8 percent of the votes.

McConnell received 52.8 percent of the students’ votes, while Bruce Lunsford received 47.2 percent. Students voted 60.7 percent in favor of Ben Chandler for U.S. representative in the Sixth District, versus 39.3 percent for Jon Larson.

The race for president was much tighter in Berea Community Schools, where McCain got 48.6 percent of the vote and Obama got 47.1 percent.

The McConnell/ Lunsford race also was close among Berea students, with McConnell getting 172 votes and Lunsford garnering 166.

Berea students said the economy was the most important issue our country is facing today. The majority of students all over the state had the same opinion.

In the race for U.S. representative in the Sixth District, Berea students voted 51.5 percent in favor of Jon Larson over Ben Chandler.

At Kirksville Elementary, McCain won over Obama by a wider margin, 61.7 percent to 38.3 percent.

Fourth-grade students at Kirksville “had a blast” participating in the mock election, teacher Donna Crosby said.

Before casting their votes, students participated in an entire unit of study on the election. Students learned about the three branches of government and how they operate.

Then, the students campaigned for the candidates, making posters and encouraging others to vote. The entire fourth-grade class, about 560 students, participated in the election.

“The students ran the entire election,” said Crosby, who supervised the event. “They were poll workers; they ran the campaign. I was just there for support. They really got into it.”

To help students understand what it really is like to vote, each student had to sign in before casting their ballot.

At the end of the school day, students announced the winner of the mock election during an assembly.

Crosby said the students will discuss the outcome of the real election on Wednesday.

At Waco Elementary, McCain also won by a wide margin, receiving 66.5 percent of the votes compared to Obama’s 32.1 percent.

McConnell received 52.1 percent of the vote from Waco students, while Lunsford got 47.9 percent.

Waco students thought the economy was a big issue, but not the biggest issue facing the U.S. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan received 26 percent of the votes, with the economy closely following with 22.5 percent. Health care quality and costs came in third with 21 percent.

Barack Obama was the winner at Mayfield Elementary School, with 58.4 percent voting in his favor and 30.8 percent casting ballots for McCain. About 7.5 percent of students voted Libertarian.

At Mayfield, Chandler received 59.3 percent of the votes against Larson.

The biggest issue facing the country, according to Mayfield students, is the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, followed by health-care quality and costs.

Results from St. Mark, Model and Silver Creek were not posted Monday on the Secretary of the State’s Web site.

This was third and final mock election this year for the Office of the Secretary of State.

The first, conducted with Kentucky Governor’s Scholars, saw McCain win the race for President by 2.5 percent. The second election, conducted with college students across the state, saw Obama win by 11.1 percent and Mitch McConnell win by 1.4 percent of the vote.

During these mock elections, the Office of the Secretary of State registered nearly 1,000 students to vote.

The mock election is one of the programs promoted by the Civic Literacy Initiative of Kentucky. The CLIK, directed by Grayson and the Kentucky Workgroup on Civic Literacy, is striving to develop a strategy for enhancing long-term civic engagement and literacy. In recent years, Kentucky has been recognized as a national leader in this effort.

“The National Student/Parent Mock Election seeks to turn the sense of powerlessness that keeps young Americans and their parents from going to the polls into a sense of the power of participation in our democracy,” said a press release from Grayson’s office.

“By involving students in the democratic process, we wish to not only energize young people to vote, but to also remind their family and friends about the importance of voting, ...” Grayson said. “This project is an exceptional tool for confronting, and in many cases, reversing the disturbing voting trends in the 18-24 year old demographic.”

Lorie Love can be reached at llove@richmondregister.com or 624-6690.