It’s pretty safe to say that no one knows how to vote like Prairie View A&M. Students were lined up at the Waller County Community Center to vote at 7 a.m. on “Super Tuesday” morning. By 1 p.m., more than 1, 000 students had voted.
Candidates for each party were seen across from the voting polls, attempting to gain last minute votes from students.
The large turnout of students at the voting polls surprised a lot a people.
“I’m really shocked,” said Dennis Johnson, a sophomore electrical engineering major and Rock The Vote chair for SGA. ” I’m still surprised that more people turned out in early voting than in the primaries.”
In the primaries, which were held in April 2004, only 507 students voted.
During early voting last week, the number of voters doubled.
Johnson said the high number of voters at the polls is due to students getting involved on campus.
On Monday night a voting caravan drove around all three of the Phases, as well as the U.C. area, to encourage students to vote.
About 20 cars, all packed with student volunteers, started honking their horns and chanting pro-vote slogans in Phases I and II parking lots. They also talked to some of the students to remind them about the importance of voting.
“We did it to make sure that voting was fresh in their minds,” said La’Shaun Reggans, a sophomore SGA member, who was one of the organizers who made the voting caravan possible. “I was basically there to make sure that things were organized, but I was also there for support.”
SGA members weren’t the only ones lending their support for the event. Many Greek organizations donated their time to encourage freshmen living in U.C. to vote. “The freshmen really look up to the Greeks,” said Reggans. ” so it was really great that they came out to support us.”
Many other organizations have also joined the movement to get students to vote this year. From the NAACP’s voter registration drives, to the printing and distributing “Rock the Vote” T-shirts, their efforts could be seen all over the campus.
“The NAACP as well as the SGA played key roles,” said Reggans.
“Everything that others have done all year has led up to this, election day.”
Just last week, the NAACP held an open forum with many of the Waller County candidates who wanted to talk to students. The hope was that by seeing the candidates first hand, the students would realize that their votes were significant.