Note: This is Part 2 of a series on avoiding claims of election fraud by Andrew Cader, Votenet Senior Elections Consultant. See Part 1: Password Concerns.

Besides concerns about voters sharing their passwords, an election event can be tainted if voters claim they were able to vote multiple times, or “double voting.” This can come up in a number of ways. Often times, administrators set up multiple election events that either run at the same time or will overlap. Voters may have access to multiple ballots in different elections. For universities, spring elections often consist of an SGA Election that the entire student body is eligible to vote on, but also a class officers’ election running simultaneously. Students would vote in the SGA election and their class election.  These are two separate elections. The confusion arises when the election administrator either combines ballots or duplicates similar questions on multiple ballots. Read the rest of this entry →

As a part of  the planning process for setting up an online election, the election consultants at Votenet try to help organizations think through every possible scenario for voting to ensure all eligible voters can participate.

The University of Dayton’s recent student government election is a perfect example of why this research is so important. The school has more than 6,900 undergraduates, and they based voting rights on the number of credits. Upperclassmen with more than 60 credits could vote for senior class senator, but seniors returning for a fifth year of school were blocked from voting. Read the rest of this entry →

Votenet’s recent survey of Higher Education Institutions revealed that more than 70% are using some sort of online voting for their student government elections, and that switching to online voting increased voter turnout more than 50%. Two-Year College respondents reported an average increase of 125%!

With an overall student enrollment of 9,000, Murray State University was struggling with its voter turnout for student government elections. The freshman senator election, for example, saw only 83 voters. The SGA coordinator decided to integrate the voting process into the existing online system that students log into for other university business.

This is a great technique to increase voter turnout. Since students are already familiar with their login system, it’s much easier for them to participate. And having the online voting system (Votenet’s eBallot, in this case) Read the rest of this entry →