By Taelyn Pauley
Your vote matters!
For many students, this is the first Presidential election they are eligible to vote in. According to students at the University of Nevada, Reno, the voting process has been an overwhelmingly positive experience.
Gray Rich, a freshman at the university, voted for the first time at the Joe Crowley Student Union.
“The people who were working the booth were super helpful,” Rich said. “They told you exactly what to do, it was very quick, very easy. It took me under five minutes.”
For some, it can be difficult to find time to vote during midterm season, but students say the Joe Crowley Student Union makes voting easy.
There are other ways to vote as well. Other options students considered were mail-in ballots or voting at the local library. The Downtown Reno Library, which is five minutes away from the university campus by car, is an alternative voting center for students.
Joan Bacani, a junior at the university, offered some helpful tips.
“Educate yourself on the candidates you are voting for,” Bacani said. “It’s very important, even if you ignore politics. Politics will affect you regardless.”
Bacani’s statement sheds light on reasons why students don’t vote. Many believe politics won’t affect them or their vote won’t matter. However, the student vote can make a big impact on the overall election.
Americans of all strides hold this opinion, not just students. Millions of Americans stay home from the polls each year.
While early voting ended Nov.1, Election Day is today,9 Tuesday, Nov. 5. Voting sites will be open across the county, with the fourth floor ballrooms at the Joe Crowley Student Union open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Anyone registered to vote in Washoe County can vote at any of the sites, listed here at the Registrar of Voters website.
If you’re not already registered to vote and you have a Nevada ID, you can register in-person at your polling site before you go vote. Students living on campus, who don’t have a valid mailing address because the resident halls don’t receive U.S. Postal Service mail, can use this mailing address provided by the school as their Washoe County address.
There is still time to vote and make your voice heard.
Taelyn Pauley can be reached via email at peregrineh@unr.edu or on Instagram @NevadaSagebrush.
Editor’s note: due to ongoing issues with our website, Taelyn Pauley is not listed in the article header as the correct author. The header author is listed as Derek Raridon; however once the website is fixed, all bylines associated with this article will be correctly listed as Taelyn Pauley’s.
