Availability of early voting on campus prompted an undeniable show of bipartisanship between Duke Republicans and Democrats-students from both groups sported "I voted" stickers as red, white and blue symbols of their contribution to the upcoming election.
The phenomenon of stickered co-eds is not unique to Duke: The idea that this is the year youth will finally get out and vote is being propagated by media across America. Many voter registration groups have reported that there has been an unprecedented increase of registration among youth.
And student political leaders from both parties emphasized that although previous campaigns have been said to mobilize young people, this year will have a record youth turnout. They also agreed that the young electorate is more supportive of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama and more involved in his campaign.
"Youth voters have always been kind of transient people. Now, we live on the Internet," said senior Abby Alger, co-founder of Real World Republicans, a conservative blog for high school and college students. "Thanks to the Internet, Obama has been able to say, 'Own part of my campaign. Part of this is yours.' McCain has not done this."
According to The Chronicle's election poll, conducted from Oct. 27-30 among undergraduates eligible to vote, Duke students favor Obama by a nearly 4-to-1 margin. Additionally, 92.5 percent of respondents think Obama will win the election.
Nationwide, 62 percent of young voters 18-to-29 said they favor Obama, and 34 percent favor Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, according to the Gallup Poll daily tracking from Oct. 1-20. The poll also indicated, however, that the percent of likely voters from that age group-12 to 14 percent-will be only slightly higher than in the past few elections and mirror the 1996 statistic.
Obama's campaign has targeted young people particularly and involved many through technology, said Duke Democrats President Ben Bergmann, a sophomore. Students can download a list of names from Obama's Web site and make promotional calls from their dorm rooms, he noted.
Senior Sunny Kantha, Duke Student Government executive vice president, worked for the Obama campaign at its national headquarters this past summer. Kantha said Obama's campaign strategy has special segments devoted to the youth vote, including an active Facebook group.
"This guy exudes youth, so it's not surprising that youth is coming out in droves," he added.
Junior Eric Kaufman, who interned with the McCain campaign, also said young voters have impacted the Obama campaign more than the McCain campaign.
"Obama is hoping that young voters put them over the top in areas where the GOP is typically stronger," he wrote in an e-mail. "This forces both candidates to pay attention to the issues young people care about."
But Duke College Republicans Chair Vikram Srinivasan, a junior, said it is yet to be seen whether young people actually turn out to support Obama. He said a large percentage of youth voters are registered Independents, and that McCain is historically popular with Independent voters.
Obama's campaign with the slogan of "change" has helped him most in capturing the youth vote, said Political Science Professor Michael Gillespie. He explained that Obama runs a campaign of charisma rather than substance, but McCain's campaign has shown neither.
Additionally, younger voters tend to value experience less than older voters, Gillespie said.
"[Youth voters] have a candidate that appeals to them with the idea of change and a promise to make things better. Like him, they don't understand that all change is very, very difficult," Gillespie wrote in an e-mail. "I'm glad to see [young people] involved and worried they will be disillusioned by the next four years."
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