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School
Election Administration
As
student governments approach the adoption of fair elections systems the difficulty in implementation
is often the main obstacle to reform. But many times, the
current election method in use can easily be modified to accommodate
fair elections.
If
you are running an election with a small number of ballots, less
than 500 ballots, you can easily use a paper ballot and count votes
by hand. If you are running a larger election, such as at a
large university, you might want to use Internet voting or optically
scanned ballots. There are also several low-cost software
packages available that schools can use to tally votes. [NOTE:
Listing here does not constitute an endorsement or guarantee about
the products mentioned.]
- Voting
Solutions produces the software used to count the
choice voting election for city council and school board in
Cambridge, MA. It is
very robust, professional-quality software that is, unfortunately,
expensive for use in commercial or public elections. Fortunately, the firm
produces a "lite" version for use in non-government elections and
only charge $40. You
can get it at http://www.votingsolutions.com/package.htm. The
lite version is suitable for use in most private elections and
produces a fully auditable report. It's not especially user
friendly, but once you get your voting data formatted properly,
it's very fast and easy to use.
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Many
schools also use online voting as a way to increase turnout and
facilitate the ballot-counting process. Fair elections systems can
also be integrated into an existing online voting system. For a
demonstration of how IRV might look online at your school, please
visit these sites.
Please contact [email protected]
or call the Center at 301-270-4616 if you
would like advice on the logistics of administering a large
instant runoff or choice voting election. The Center will be glad
to provide assistance to schools and organizations
using fair elections systems. |
