The League of Women Voters came to Oak Park High School on May 1 to teach young voters about a style of voting called ranked choice voting.
RVC is a voting style that allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference instead of casting a singular vote for their favorite candidate. If there is a split between which candidate gets the majority of votes, the lowest-performing candidate is eliminated and the votes are redistributed to the voters’ next choice. This process continues until one candidate reaches a majority.
“In short, Ranked Choice Voting, or RCV, allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference rather than voting for just one,” founder of Ventura County Voting Reform Project Paul Copley said.
RVC produces precise results by accurately reflecting the overall preferences of voters. It also helps avoid multiple long and unnecessary runoffs.
“All of this happens with a single ballot and a single trip to the polls, eliminating the need for costly, low-turnout runoff elections while ensuring that the winner has broad consensus support among voters,” Copley said.
Institutions like FairVote, the California RCV Coalition and the Ventura County Voting Reform Project are working to educate communities such as OPHS, by setting up informational stands and pop up booths.
“We have online RCV election tools to run mock elections that we use to help people understand RCV,” Copley said.
To understand and participate in this concept, students at OPHS can answer a mock school poll that stimulates ranked choice voting. That way students can get real first hand experience in RCV style. This allows students to be educated on how RVC works when and if it is implemented. The poll allows students to rank options and see how votes would be redistributed across multiple rounds.
Using this link, students can read about upcoming election representatives and become more informed.
Completing this mock election at OPHS gives students firsthand experience with how votes are counted and how majority support is determined.
