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T h u r s d a y, O c t o b e r 1 3 , 2 0 1 6 | U s i s h i e l d . c o m | v o l . 4 7 i s s u e 9
NEARLY 1,000 NEW REGISTRATIONS
Photo by Jordan Auker | The Shield
Freshman nursing major Trevor Adams registers to vote Sept. 20 at one of the Squawk the Vote registration tables. Adams said that even if registration had not been available on campus he would have registered to vote in the upcoming election.
Indiana voter registration comes to a close by Sarah loesch editor@usishield.com @seloesch
The registration effort by Squawk the Vote registered 931 people to vote. The effort came close the original 1,000 registration goal and Cynthia Brinker said everyone involved felt like it went very well. “When you think about voting and when you think about the impact of decisions made by elected officials, many of these decisions are going to have an effect on people in college right now,” Brinker said. “That age group tends to not be an age group that votes a lot. It shows the number of people voting is much lower in the 18-22 age range.” The vice president for government
and community relations said Squawk the Vote focused on individual tablings whether it be under the University Center breezeway, at the involvement fair or during events such as the recent debate watch party. Brinker said the interest came from wanting to get more people registered and knowing that there were some students on campus who would have their first chance to vote this year. “We just wanted to make it easy for them,” Brinker said. She said the biggest concern for her was seeing that there were some people who did not want to register. She said students would often say they didn’t know enough to make an informed decision. “It is important for people to exercise their right to vote,” she said. “It’s a big election.”
She said everyone should take the time to use the resources around them to learn about who is on their ballot before election day. “Take time to study it a little bit as opposed to just walking into the voting booth and picking a name,” she said. “Listen to the debates, (there is) a lot of information out right now.” Teddi Rausch said she thinks a lack of information in terms of the voting process can also hinder someone’s ability to register and exercise their right to vote. She said a lack of education can really discourage people from voting. “It’s almost like voter suppression,” the president of the College Democrats said. Rausch said before she joined the College Democrats she didn’t see much activity or opportunity to reg-
ister to vote on campus. She said if more organizations jumped on board with the effort it could be even more successful. “With that lack of effort from people on campus, I think people are just getting frustrated,” she said. Rausch said she thought Squawk the Vote was an incredible effort, but one area she feels could have used more attention was absentee voting. “Absentee ballot applications are the hardest thing to really accomplish in the sense of trying to make sure people send in those forms,” she said. She said she felt the tabling the College Democrats did was successful in the sense that they were able to target a tabling focused on absentee voting. For Daniel McMurtry uneducated voters was his biggest concern.
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‘Out of balance’ Vaughn to bring gerrymandering to USI by sarah loesch editor@usishield.com @seloesch
Julia Vaughn said election rigging is real and it is called gerrymandering. Vaughn will visit the university Oct. 19 to discuss the redistricting issue as part of the MPA Speaker Series. Her event will start with a screening of Gerrymandering, a film which she said is a great educational tool. “I think a lot of people are familiar with the term
gerrymandering, but they don’t know the real impact,” Vaughn said. “It does a good job of explaining that, it’s also an inspirational story. It’s all about partisan political interest.” Vaughn is currently the policy director for Common Cause Indiana where she began work in 1995. Common Cause Indiana is a grassroots organization which aims to create open, honest and accountable government. It works as a nonpartisan system focused on the public interest.
SGA tables resolutions Organization plans to review court clerk position, budget, discipline process by riley guerzini news@usishield.com @Guerzwinski
The Student Government Association tabled six resolutions at last Thursday’s meeting. All resolutions brought up in the meeting were tabled, which means they suspend consideration of the resolution indefinitely,
usually until the next week. “Tabling allows the members to think about what’s being brought up,” SGA Attorney General Jerry Boyd said. “It’s just for them to think of different scenarios that could happen with the resolutions and just give them the time to think and kind of just digest their thoughts about what could happen or how exactly it would play out.”
Boyd said the executive board discussed getting rid of the court clerk last semester. “The court clerk, really the maximum amount they can get is around 2 hours a week, so it’s not even really profitable for someone,” he said. “I think it was a limit of 10 hours a week and they were never able to reach that.” Boyd said he and the
rules committee previously talked about having just one staff member to handle the court clerk duties such as traffic appeals, record keeping and attendance. “The executive clerk, in their requirements, there is a clause in their position to insure the smoothness of SGA, so we kind of interpreted that as we can also use them for the court,” he said.
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Watch for the fall 2016 edition of
on stands now!
A guide to usi athletics
sga, PAGE 3