Today I went to my local polling place at a YMCA. I had a great time hanging out with some older ladies and saw about 5 voters in my hour there, prettty boring. But, I got a pretty sweet donut and learned a LOT about the polls, how to vote, and just how the whole process works. 

Question 1.

What motivated you to come out and vote?

"It's my right as an American to vote. Because, most people don't take advantage of there right to vote and it's not right that people don't come out and vote.

Question 2.

What would you like to see changed in our political system.

"Money being donated by corporations. There shouldn't be any more political donations. And, Barack Obama should back up what he said and have some influence on our government and our Country.

Question 3.

Do you vote in every election?(How regularly do you vote?)

"Every Election i have voted in."

Question 4.

Do you know why we vote on Tuesdays?

"I don't actually know, but i like that we vote on Tuesdays. It's better than mondays."

Question 5.

Where have you encountered the highest amount of ad campaigning? Radio, Tv, print, internet, other.

"There's a website called PoliticsPa.com that gave me a lot of information. Since, this year is a dry election and most people don't know about the judges or commissioners out there people don't necessarily care about this election as opposed to the election in 2008 and the upcoming one in 2012"

Question 6.

What was the most memorable campaign ad that you have encountered.

" During the Obama Campaign in 2008 he brought up these messages about hope and his slogan about "Yes we can"

My sound didn't work for some reason, so here's a summary of the interview with Ms. Rachel:

(Ms. Rachel's answers were long, so I had to summarize.)

Q: What motivated you to come out and vote?

A: I come out and vote for African-American rights. We have fought for years to gain our rights -and not only African Americans but women and the poor also. The government only listens to those who have money or are in their system. People have to realize that this isn't just a man's world anymore this is a people's world and the people should control our government.

Q: What would you like to see changed in our political system?

A: i would like to see a committee for each city, that met about once a month and reported back to the president and congress, so they could hear everyone's opinion.

Q: Do we know why we vote on Tuesday?

A: No I do not, do you know? (I responded by telling her that according to a seminar I attended the day before it was established years ago and it was because of people who traveled by horse and buggy. They made voting day on Tuesday so people who needed to travel far could do so and get back without traveling on religious days.)

Q:Are you always sure of who you are going to vote for when you walk into the booth or are you still deliberating?

A: I always know who I'm going to vote for.

Q: What changes do you hope to see in Philadelphia as a result of this election?

A: I would like to see Philadelphia become more economical. Right now there are a lot of people on welfare and disability and unemployment. I would like to see ways to handle these issues, a way to help people out.

The first person I interviewed was Jennifer Hartman and she was a volunteer at the polls. 

Summary: 

Jennifer has voted for every election from our small elections to the Presidential elections. Why do we have voting day on Tuesdays? She has no clue, but it is what it is. The most memorable campaigns are the ones for the 2008 elections because everyone was so hyped up about it all. As for change in our political system, she'd like to see our government improve because we, Philadelphia, are not in the best economical state at the moment. I told Jennifer about my group's benchmark and what we wanted to do to improve the voting system, she agrees that we should get rid of the Electoral Colleges because it is, of course, unfair and we are disenfranchised. 

The second person I interviewed was an old man (Louis?)because the woman Sabrina interviewed told us to see the views of an older person and differentiate her answers and his. We're outside because I was waiting for an old person to show up and just asked if he was going to go inside and vote. 

Summary: 

Louis is obviously old and he too, votes every year. Why? He doesn't know really. People remind him and he shows up. The thing is, Louis doesn't expect to see anything change from this election. As for the amount of impact he has on voting, he doesn't care of know how much his vote will impact the outcome. So if he doesn't really care, why did he come out and vote? Louis was reminded by his neighbors to vote when he was strolling through his neighborhood. He also said his "friend" Obama called him and told him to go out and vote. (HAHA - funny old people..) 

Interviewee: Josina Blocker (My Mother)

1. Q: What motivates you to come out and vote?

     A: What motivates me? The future of my child.

Q: What would you like to see changed in our political system?

     A: Umm. I would like to see the bickering amongst parties I would like to see that become more partisanship  rather than bipartisanship

Q: Do you know why we vote on Tuesday?

    A: Do you know why? Because I don’t.

Q: Do you know about the law that states prisoners not being able to vote? Do you agree or disagree with that and why?

    A: I feel as though they only put this law through because of our president. I disagree with that law because if they are still considered US citizens and did their time they should be able to let their voice be heard just like any other US citizen.

Q: Did you learn about voting in school? If yes, did that impact your willingness to vote today?

    A: No, I didn’t really learn about school that much it wasn’t a big topic back then and that was in the 80’s really. Voting to me is much different then what it used to be. Voting is more popular than it ever was before because of our black president.

Q: Are you always sure of who you are going to vote for when you walk into the booth?

     A: Yes I am.

Q: Do you vote in every election?

    A: Yes.

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          For American History we had to analyze and interpret different graphs that represented the population increase correlating to immigration. Interestingly enough, it seemed that inhabitants of this world would come to America even in its worst time of peril.  I would say that the population/immigration wouldn't increase and probably stay at a steady rate. With the constant fighting between congress, the economy, and the revival of the judgmental American I cannot imagine an influx of people migrating to the U.S.

         Originally, we had planned to create a video representing immigration and population in a super creative way. But nevertheless we decided to stick to the normal criteria of a visual project. The first picture is a picture of my original work, the second is the group presentation. Nothing was challenging besides effective communication between the group members. Honestly to do this over, I would have done the video if more time was allotted. It would have been a nice addition to this blog post. The most difficult task was having creativity while trying to make a decent mathematical/visual representation of the information given to us.

My group decided to do a project by hand, instead of doing it as a powerpoint or a project on the computer.  We intended to draw walls with groups of people climbing over them.  Each group would be holding a flag with the amount of of immigrants migrated into the US in that time period, and then on the walls we wrote what happened to cause them to come to America.

• What surprised you most about this information?  What seemed quite obvious about explaining this data set?
  
  I was most surprised about the reasons people in the US didn't want them in American and all the things they said, and how the felt about the other people, especially the Asians during the period when they were all banned to enter the US.  It seemed very obvious that when the government decided to tell them they couldn't enter America, that's when a lot more Asians began to enter.
  
  
• Looking at the overall trend and incorporating what you know about the US presently, predict and defend the immigration trend for the next two decades.
  
  I feel that it will continue, it may slow down a little though due to the economy and the recession that everyones in at the moment, but when, and if we ever get out of this recession and get back on our feet, i'm pretty sure that it will increase.  
  
  
• Describe how you made a decision on how to visually represent the information.
  We all felt that since Kamilah is a talented drawer, and everyone was doing something on the computer, we could be different and use our strengths.
  
  
• What parts of group work were challenging?
  
  Figuring out how everyone could contribute was a little hard, but after we figured that out, the hardest part was the drawing for me because im a very terrible artist, that's why i said we "intended to draw walls" for some reason i couldn't draw the walls correctly so we switched them to books, but the drawing was simply the hardest part to me.
  
  
• What would you do differently if you had this project to do over?
  
  I'd work on my drawing so that we could've stuck to the plan so that they would look like walls, instead of books, but other then that, nothing, overall i thought the project was pretty good.