Party at the Polls - Gettysburg College, PA

As Election Day grew closer my Democracy Matters chapter was trying to think of a way to get students more excited about the political process. At Gettysburg College we have access to a student “nightclub” called The Attic. Every weekend there are a variety of activities there and it is set up to entertain hundreds of people, if needed. My group and I thought it would be a great idea to have some kind of party in The Attic after the elections to sort of celebrate those who voted. The national Democracy Matters set us up with Working Assets (www.workingforchange.com). This organization has donated over $50 million to non-profit organizations since 1985. They came up with and funded the idea to hold election parties throughout the country at college campuses. This was made possible by working with a few of the Democracy Matters college chapters.

Once we established our coalition with Working Assets we started to plan our own “Party at the Polls.” We wanted to make sure that we could reach out to our unique campus. We are a relatively conservative liberal arts college in a very small town. Our biggest challenge was how to get students to come out to an event on a Tuesday night. Our first idea was to get a live band. This fell through because of the timing of the event so we really needed to think fast to come up with something just as good. We ended up deciding that a DJ and all-you-can-eat wings would bring students out. We also held a raffle with several gift certificates from generous local businesses and an i-Pod shuffle. We thought that a raffle throughout the night would not only pique the interest of students, but possibly also get them to stay throughout the whole event. Everything was planned, now we just needed to pray for nice weather!

We held our election party from 8-10pm in The Attic, and it was a very successful event. We had 130 attendees, many of whom stayed for a good portion of the night. We ate through over 600 wings and gave away over 20 great raffles. Throughout the night we would interrupt the music to raffle off a prize and inform students about who Democracy Matters is and why it should be important to them. Overall, I was very happy with our event. I would have loved to have found a way to get the attendees more involved in our discussion but this is a very hard goal to obtain with a large audience. I also would have enjoyed having a live band and think that it would get the students excited too, especially if the band joined us in our wishes for a strengthened democracy. I learned that organizing an event takes a lot of teamwork. Everyone in the group was really helpful in doing all of those extra tasks that popped up at the last minute; like running to the store for those all too essential salty snacks to go along with our wings! The most important part of planning an event like this is having a great team to help you out. We were all paid off by great food and times at our event.

Devon Marshall

President and Founder, Democracy Matters Gettysburg College Chapter