After a joint decision by Student Council and the Honor Committee last week prevented students in the School for Continuing and Professional Studies from voting in today's election, the Committee pondered potential solutions for the problem of a lack of voting rights for SCPS students yesterday.
The current Committee likely will make a formal recommendation to next year's Committee, which will take over April 1. Current representatives said they will recommend that next year's Committee act quickly on the issue, regardless of their personal stance on the matter.
"Obviously it will depend on their personal opinion," Committee Chairman Thomas Hall said. "Personally I think they should open up the franchise [of voting] to all students affected by the honor code, which is all enrolled students."
Hall added that such a change would have to be accompanied by a change in required voter participation standards. Currently, the honor constitution mandates that an honor referendum must win a majority vote and receive yes votes from 10 percent of the total student body to pass.
Hall said he fears that even if all SCPS students were given the opportunity to vote, most would not, making it very difficult for a referendum to produce a turnout high enough to receive the votes of 10 percent of the student body.
Only 4,000 total students voted last year, according to Katie Gillespie, Committee vice chairwoman for education. If SCPS students were included, almost 4,000 of all voting students would need to vote yes for a referendum to pass.
Because the average voter turnout in recent elections has been between 2,000 and 4,000 students, Hall suggested that next year's Committee might lower the required percentage of students who need to vote yes on a referendum to 5 or 7 percent of the total student body, if SCPS students are included.
Hall also said he hoped the issue would be dealt with in a constitutional amendment rather than a by-law. Such an amendment would need to be ratified by a school-wide vote.
Hall suggested that the fall Student Council election, usually only for College students, could be expanded to put forward such a referendum and allow all students to vote on it.
"Its been done before," Hall said. "It would just require a very aggressive education campaign."
Hall's suggestion to lower the percentage of yes votes stems from his opinion that SCPS students should be allowed to vote on honor referenda, but very few actually will.
"It's hard enough to get people on Grounds to vote, it would be harder still to get a 40-year-old with a family in Hampton Roads to participate," Hall said. "They should. Who knows, maybe they will surprise us"
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