About 40 Deputy Voter Registrars were sworn in Thursday in the Mesa Courtyard at University of Texas Permian Basin.
The students are freshmen and sophomores in the honors seminar at UTPB. They register people to vote in the community, Ector County Elections Bilingual Coordinator and Voter Outreach Amanda Snyder said.
Associate Professor of Political Science Robert Perry said the students primarily register students on campus, but they hold some off-campus events.
Snyder said the deputy registrars are very important because they are the ones that can get into town when Elections Office staff are busy.
She added that the project has helped get people signed up to cast ballots over the years.
“Like he said, primarily they register students that are on campus. The reason for that is that they don’t have to request a ballot by mail, or our office doesn’t get bombarded on Election Day,” Snyder said.
Perry said the deputy voter registrar project is part of the class, but their grades aren’t based on it.
Snyder said quite a few have helped her with outreach efforts at Permian and Odessa high schools.
“That’s another thing that we do is that we go out to the high schools and try to get students involved in our democracy,” Snyder said.
Students learn about voting, voting rights, state government, federal government and their limits, Perry said.
“What’s really important is that they understand that it’s a right that we have and we shouldn’t take for granted, because there are other countries that obviously can’t do that. There are other countries that they literally have to walk for miles to even cast their vote,” Snyder said.
“Plus they’re our future, so they need to get involved,” she added.
