The importance of voting has been a hot topic this year, especially with the upcoming election and student organizations like MSA launching campaigns to encourage student to get out and vote. But that does very little when you could be penalized for missing class to cast your vote.
The current University of Minnesota Policy states that “Voting in a regional, state, or national election is not an unavoidable or legitimate absence.” As citizens, it is our right and responsibility to vote. Several constitutional amendments require that voting cannot be limited based on race, gender, sex and ability etc. When a University doesn’t excuse me for exercising my right at a citizen… isn’t that somehow denying me of my right to vote? Of course there are some professors who disregard the University Absence Policy and excuse students for voting, but some don’t. Students will lose points, and they aren’t always allowed to makeup work they missed.
According to the Pioneer Press, University spokesperson, Dan Wolter, said “..that he finds it hard to believe that students would find a hard time voting, since the polls are open for 13 hours.” However, Students have no idea how long it’s going to take to reach the polls or how much time they’ll have to spend waiting in line.
It’s clearly been a while since Mr. Wolter has been a student. Sure, the polling places are open for 13 hours, but the logistics aren’t that simple, with more than half of students depending on public transportation, biking , or walking to get to the correct polling place AND BACK before their potential first class at 8 a.m. Even if their first class was at 9 a.m., that’s still pushing it since there’s the early morning rush of people trying to vote before they get to work. Most students have class back-to-back until around at least 2:00 p.m. Then, the rush of people who didn’t get to vote that morning starts. But what about students who need to go to work after school? I’m one of those students. My day starts at 9 a.m. and ends at 11 p.m. Where in that time do I vote? If I don’t have time to eat, I certainly don’t have time to vote.
I’m sure there are many students that have time to vote… but what about the ones that don’t? Does the University not care that they’re deterring the very students they’re encouraging to vote? The Office for Student Affairs emailed all University students encouraging them to register to vote on Oct. 7, We get it! We’ve registered! But now we’re debating between exercising our right as a citizen to get out and vote or losing points and missing lessons in class.
What harm would it do to make voting an excused absence? It’s ONE day of the year. A student’s vote is just as important as a faculty member or professor’s. There are already barriers in place that keep students from voting, and this is just adding to those. If a specific group of people are deterred from voting, that’s a large chunk of the population whose voices are muted, stifled and pushed aside.
The University of Minnesota cannot pride itself on “[preparing] students to meet the great challenges facing our state, our nation, and our world” without allowing students to exercise their basic right–the right that the United States was founded on– freedom and democracy. If that’s their mission, if that’s their goal, the University must then understand that taking part in one of the most important civic duties this country has cannot be mimicked in any classroom.