O Canada, shouldn’t you vote?

Having the lowest voter turnout of any age group, Canadian university students need to embrace their civic duty and utilize their right to vote

By: Zarah Rahman, Opinion Contributor

Every four years, Canadian students huddle around laptops, like watching a reality show, as news anchors crack down on maps filled with red or blue as the results of the American election come in.

At McMaster, US politics has great engagement - a panel event discussing the November 5th election nearly sold out to 500 attendees, both online and in-person. But do we have this same energy for our own local and federal politics?

Canadian youth aged 18-30 has an alarmingly lower voter engagement compared to other age groups. One survey by the Canadian government found that youth voter turnout was 14 per cent lower than those aged 47 years or older during the 2019 federal election.

Many factors may contribute to this, like variable civic education. As a Toronto District School Board student, I have participated in Student Vote since elementary school and was taught how to research political campaigns. These classroom lessons helped me understand how to make the important decision on who to vote for, which encouraged me to vote for all elections that I was eligible for.

However, after a conversation with my friends, I found that those who did not have this education may face greater difficulty navigating confusing political campaigns and races. A survey by Civix Canada found that two-thirds of Canada’s youth report teaching civic education not being a priority at their schools. Individuals who do not learn about how how government institutions work are less likely to vote.

Another barrier may be the accessibility to voting services. In 2021, the Canadian Vote on Campus program was suspended for the 44th general election due to COVID-19 and the snap-election call, limiting many post-secondary students from an accessible polling station.

The program allowed students to vote for either their home riding or for the riding of their university. This program enabled students not able to visit home to vote strategically.

When coming to university, we meet people from various educational backgrounds. This is why we have many introductory courses to make sure all students receive essential foundational knowledge. I think this should also be the case for civic education within McMaster, which has thousands of eligible student voters.

One model to implement this could follow that of the CONSENT 1A00: It Takes All Of Us offered by the Sexual Violence Prevention and Response Office, which auto-enrolls McMaster first-years to spread awareness on sexual violence. On a larger scale, McMaster could work towards increasing on-campus awareness of voting stations and resources for voters. This could also mean encouraging Elections Canada to bring back the Vote on Campus initiative.

On a personal level, we need to reflect on our civic duties. When facing uncertainty about who we should vote for or how our electoral politics even function, we could utilize tools, such as VoteCompass, to help us understand our political alignment and find our places in the political sphere. Discussions with friends and family could also help us understand diverse perspectives while also encouraging our circles to vote.

Politics impacts all aspects of student life. From your city’s local climate response, to the province’s OSAP policies and the Federal Government’s pharmacare pilot, we have the power to influence change with our vote. With the possibility of elections both federally and provincially occurring within the next year, this rings true now more than ever.

We know the power of paper with our degrees - but we can also see this power reflected on the ballot. With these upcoming Canadian elections, as students we should all contribute to increasing the currently sad voter turnout of our age range and embrace our civic duty as citizens of a democracy.