The Camosun College Student Society (CCSS) and the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations (CASA) are working together to launch the Get Out the Vote campaign, which encourages students to vote in the upcoming federal election. The campaign was launched at Camosun on Tuesday, September 3 and runs until October 21, which is federal election day.
The CCSS and CASA are directing their efforts wherever needed to encourage students to vote. This can be on social media, through canvassing, by mailing out flyers, or by going out and talking to people face to face, for example, on campus. This fall, CASA and the CCSS (and other student associations across Canada) have created the non-partisan Get Out the Vote campaign to help motivate post-secondary students to get involved in the political process.
CCSS external executive Fillette Umulisa believes that students need to see how important their vote is.
“I think the whole purpose of this campaign is to mobilize students to get out and vote, because CASA and the [Camosun College] Student Society feel that democracy is important and if students actually vote, they can help shape the future,” she says. “It is also easier now than ever for students to vote, so we don’t see why we shouldn’t be out there encouraging them to vote, because that is what counts.”
Umulisa is enthusiastic about the campaign and hopes that it will speak to students and show them that their opinion is important.
“We will be doing a lot of mobilization, so we’ll table, we’ll host events, we’ll go to classes to talk to students,” she says. “We are going to be on campus getting students to pledge to vote, giving them information about where to vote, directing them to sites like Elections Canada, for example. We try and find out what they are wanting to know.”
Umulisa says that the campaign is completely non-partisan, and says that the CCSS is hosting a candidate’s forum on Wednesday, October 2.
“For students that are interested, there will be people that are running that you can meet and talk to,” she says, “but we are not pointing any students in any direction, or canvassing for any political party.”
The average overall voter turnout in federal elections has remained below 70 percent since 1993, according to the Canadian Library of Parliament; however, the youth vote has continued to climb. In the last federal election, in 2015, the youth turnout was 57.1 percent, an 18-percent increase from 2011.
Third-year Marketing student Jodi Shambrook believes that voting is the only way to voice concerns about the government’s decision-making process.
“I definitely think it’s important,” says Shambrook, “especially when you have people who don’t vote and who then complain about who gets in or the decisions that have been made.”
Shambrook says that being politically active is a sure way to be heard as a student.
“I don’t really believe that you have the right to complain if you aren’t active,” says Shambrook, “and if you don’t put in your vote, things won’t change. I think it’s really important that everyone exercises their right to vote.”
First-year Business student Reid Taylor says it’s important to vote.
“I think 100 percent it’s important for students to vote in the election,” says Taylor.
First year Arts and Science student Bailey Pepper thinks that it’s crucial for students to vote.
“I really think it’s so important for students to get out and vote, because everyone fought for the right to be able to vote, and that’s overlooked a lot,” says Pepper. “I think that the government does have a lot to do with our post-secondary schooling, and it affects us. I think that students need to learn everything they can about it, and participate.”