Internet projects underway as Wake Forest prepares for Oct. 11 debate

Students at Wake Forest University are leading their peers and voting-age adults toward greater awareness of political issues through two Internet projects as the upcoming Oct. 11 presidential debate at the university nears.

Through university partnerships with Internet firms SpeakOut.com and Opinioneering Corp., Wake Forest undergraduates are working to encourage young people to become more interested and involved in the political process.

The first project launched the week of Sept. 18 through a partnership with Opinioneering Corp. Through a link from the university’s debate Web site, http://debate.wfu.edu, visitors will meet a panel of Wake Forest students who are developing and leading online discussions on foreign policy, affirmative action and other election year issues.

Each member of the student panel has chosen topics and posted related sets of questions on the site. Visitors are able to register their responses to the questions in an open-ended format designed to draw responses from other viewers. Participants are also able to read what others have posted and choose whether or not to vote in agreement with previous posts.

The site operates in “real time,” allowing visitors to watch a continuously refreshed screen that lists the percentages of viewers who agreed with posted statements. A group of Wake Forest students moderate the discussions and control the site.

“We are honored to help Wake Forest students take a centerstage role in this fall’s campaign season,” said Jeff Zucker, chief executive officer of Opinioneering. “These students have created thoughtful questions and are eager to watch as voters from around the nation weigh-in with their views and ideas. Shared learning is what democracy is all about.”

This project will remain active until just after the presidential election.

Heath Bumgardner, a senior from Freeport, Maine; Sandy Salstrom, a junior from Woodstock, Ga.; and Luke Fedlam, a senior from Jeffersonville, N.Y., lead the student group that is working with Opinioneering Corp. They are also members of a student group that is working with the university debate committee planning for the Oct. 11 presidential debate at Wake Forest’s Wait Chapel.

“Young people rarely vote and one way to get them more involved in the political process is to give them a voice,” Bumgardner said. “We hope that the site will be a conduit of information exchange that will lead to increased youth participation in politics.”

Wake Forest students are recruiting visitors to the Opinioneering site through word-of-mouth and an extensive email campaign.

Based in Dallas, Texas, Opinioneering Corp. uses its “Consensus Builder” technology to allow an audience to communicate on a given topic. Participants can read and vote in support of previously posted opinions, and are able to enter their own ideas. Business-to-business and business-to-consumer Web sites use this technology to facilitate communication and feedback. The technology is also used on Intranet systems to allow employee communication within companies.

The second online partnership, between Wake Forest and SpeakOut.com, will debut online on Oct. 11 during the presidential debate at Wake Forest.

Through a link from the university’s debate Web site, http://debate.wfu.edu, up to 5,000 young people between the ages of 16 and 24 will be directed to SpeakOut.com to participate in a real-time national online viewer survey about the presidential debate.

Participants will watch the debate on television while viewing the Web site. Using the Speakout.com’s new “Ntercept Dial Poll” technology, survey participants will register their views on each candidate’s performance on a moment-by-moment basis. A dial meter on SpeakOut.com’s Web site will allow participants to register their approval or disapproval of a candidate’s statements on a sliding scale of 0-100.

Visitors will also be able to respond to questions posted by pollsters and members of the media.

The Washington, D.C.-based Internet company will provide a report with detailed demographic analysis of participant reactions to the debate, posting the results in second-by-second increments, within moments of the debate’s conclusion.

Wake Forest students and alumni volunteers are recruiting participants for this event.

SpeakOut.com debuted the dial poll technology during the recent Republication National Convention and the Democratic National Convention through a partnership with MSNBC. Thousands of MSNBC viewers were able to register their opinions of the convention speeches in real time, and watch the results being reported on MSNBC.

While the university’s partnership with SpeakOut.com will specifically focus on the reactions of young people, the Internet firm will also record participant responses from other segments of the American population. Information from the youth survey will be compared to the responses from people of all ages nationwide.