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| Source: Googel Images |
The traditional paper and
pencil elections, which has been used all over the world to elect presidents,
parliaments, or student councils are slowly changing.
One of the more notable examples of late has to
do with the Polytechnic of Namibia. At that tertiary educational institution,
students have been given
the opportunity to utilize a cell phone and laptop-based voting system.
More specifically, the tests were conducted with a mobile election system
developed by AdaptIT. This provides a far superior level of flexibility for the
students, because they are not bound to specific voting locations at specific
times of the day.
Instead, according to Polytechnic of Namibia
computer services department manager Juanita Frans, students were “afforded the
luxury of casting their votes via cell phones or laptops, from wherever they
were and at any time during the stated election period.”
When a traditional paper ballot-based election is
held at any other school, students would normally need to take time away from
class and other educational activities in order to cast their ballots. This
takes away from valuable school time that could otherwise be spent. With the
mobile election system, students can easily cast their ballots from home,
during a meal break, or just about anywhere else. Unsurprisingly, the young
people are very much embracing technology in elections as technology is
increasingly becoming a part of everyday life for youth all around the world.
Perhaps even more notably,
because an e-voting system was used where ballots were cast electronically, the
tabulation of the votes was far more expedient. We should mention Accuracy.
People make mistakes, computers don´t.
Also, manual counting
implies somebody interpreting what the voter marked. It is not always obvious.
When elections are electronic, no interpretation is needed. The intent of the
voter is recorded directly. In fact, the results were available immediately
after the election period officially closed. By contrast, the physical counting
of paper ballots in the same election the previous year took several days to
complete and this was with the electoral committee and the various staff
members working through the night to complete the process. Instant results are
naturally far preferable to waiting for days to get the results, not to mention
the added expense and use of time by staff to tabulate the votes with paper
ballots.
During the three and a half-day voting period, a
total of 2,600 students at the Polytechnic of Namibia were able to cast their
votes via the mobile system. This system can be similarly used at other
institutions for any kind of election. Adapt IT's Amanda Lubbe says that the
results “are updated immediately and displayed in a dashboard format” too.
Some have said that online voting may not
necessarily increase
voter turnout in general elections, but the overall use of electronic
voting technology is continuing
to grow through 2014 and beyond. The
youth of today embrace technology, particularly mobile and online technology,
and this “beta test” in Namibia clearly illustrates the many benefits of using
such a system. As schools move toward having more online resources, as well as
the use of technology like sending exam results to students directly via SMS or
through an online portal (as the Polytechnic of Namibia has been doing since
2006), the same evolution and transition should be made with student elections
as well.
