It's an election year, which can mean a busy time for an elections director. But Jennifer Price is making time to have fun this summer. The Washington County Election Commission has two different summer projects going on aimed at future voters, including the return of the "I Voted" sticker contest.
Jennifer Price: It was a great way for us to kind of engage our future voters in contributing to the voting process. So we are going to hold a new sticker contest this year. We have created two categories. It'll be kindergarten through eighth grade. And then we went ahead and did 9th grade through 12th grade, which — last time it ended at 9th grade. So we're hoping to get some older kids to submit some entries.
Matthew Moore: Another way you guys are working on building some civic engagement with younger folks is for the 250th birthday of the United States. You guys are doing the Election Saurus. Tell me more about this.
Price: Yeah. So when we did the "I Voted" sticker contest, we partnered with the public libraries here in Washington County. They held the boxes for us and everything. And then we also did an election for the Fayetteville Library, where the kids got to come in and vote on their favorite books. And so we wanted to recreate that. And we know it's the 250th birthday of the United States. So we wanted to expand on that program that we started in 2024. We met with the local libraries. They have a summer reading program, which is "Unearth a Story," which goes with dinosaurs. And they all collectively said, let's do a dinosaur election, which is what we've created. It's so much fun because it's not just the very difficult names to pronounce, but the images are on the screen. So every kid can participate because you can recognize that T-Rex or the Triceratops on the ballot. So it's a lot of fun.
Moore: You were recently in Lincoln doing this. What was the response like there?
Price: Yeah. So Lincoln launched their summer reading program on Saturday. We had over 71 ballots cast, which was a really great turnout for a local library event. The kids loved it. The parents, when they come in, they're like, oh, that's the same voting equipment that we use. That's the idea — that kids see the voting process in a very fun, positive way. Parents, if they have questions, we're there to answer those. So it's just a way for us to engage. But definitely the T-Rex was the top vote getter. Every kid looked for that on the ballot.
Moore: I love that. And so they got to use the same sort of equipment that you and I use when we vote in elections. Talk me through a little bit about what the ballot looks like for the kids.
Price: Yeah. So the ballot is divided into three parts. We've got your plant eaters, your everything eaters and your meat eaters. And so when they go in to vote, it's exactly like how adult voters go into the polls — it's on the electronic voting equipment, which makes it more fun. So they get to see how the screens work, they get to see that not everything appears on one screen, so you have to go to a second screen, they get to actually press the buttons — all of the same thing, put the ballot in. We had one young voter there, her mother was the librarian at Lincoln and she was bringing kids over, and she already had it figured out how to put the ballot into the machine, how to kind of walk them through. It was so much fun just to watch the kids engage in that process. And so they got their "I Voted" sticker. And then we had actual printed out ballots that the kids got to take with them so that they could mark which selections they had made on the electronic version.
Moore: That sounds like you've got a future poll worker there, don't you?
Price: Oh, absolutely.
Moore: So you're going to be doing this at other libraries across Washington County too. You'll be in Elkins and in Prairie Grove and in Springdale in July as well. What can people look forward to when they think about an opportunity to have their kids be a part of this process?
Price: Yeah. So we've also added West Fork — West Fork got in touch with us. So we have a date on the calendar for West Fork. It will be with other programs that the library is working on. So we hope to be able to see a bunch of kids there. But the fun thing is just getting to use the voting equipment and then seeing those dinosaurs on screen. And of course, we'll be releasing results — which library voted for which dinosaur was the favorite, and then the overall favorite for Washington County. But just that opportunity for them to see the voting process and see our office out in the public — public trust is such an important part of the election process. And this is a way for us to be in the public in an engaging way with both parents and future voters.
Moore: I wanted to touch on the parents part of this, too, because I imagine there are some parents who are there who have maybe never voted before or who aren't familiar with the process of what voting looks like and being able to engage in this with their child. I mean, there's the joke — like, am I smarter than a fifth grader — that if a fifth grader can figure this out, then so can adults too, right?
Price: Yeah. And there's nothing scary about it. That's the thing — a lot of times people, when it comes to voting, they don't know what to expect. And so it's the unknown that might keep voters from coming into the polling place. Will I know what to do? What kind of questions are they going to ask? This is a very low stress way for parents who might have any concerns about coming in to vote to actually get to see the voting equipment and then ask us questions about, well, how do I get registered to vote? Am I registered to vote? We can answer all of those questions for the parents when they're with their kids at the library. And then, of course, engaging those future voters, getting them excited about voting. And maybe when they turn 18, they'll remember, you know what, I voted on this kind of voting equipment, or I participated in an election. And it was fun. And there wasn't anything kind of scary about it. And it's a civic duty that we want to instill in our future voters.
Moore: How strict are you guys on electioneering?
Price: Oh, well, there was a lot of electioneering at the Lincoln Library. So the kids — there wasn't really a secret ballot either, you know, everybody was kind of like looking at the screen and, oh, I like this one, and they were talking it through. So definitely those rules about electioneering — we kind of are letting those slide a little bit, because the idea is to get the kids engaged and to get them talking about the voting and then to let their parents kind of see the voting process as well. So definitely people were, hey, I like this one. Like I said, the T-Rex was definitely hands down the favorite of almost everybody. So electioneering — yeah, there was a lot of it there.
Moore: Yeah, yeah. Worth being a little loose on that one.
Price: Yes, absolutely.
Moore: Anything I missed?
Price: We're doing these summer projects, trying to get our future voters engaged. But then, come the end of July, we'll start the real serious work of preparing for our general election. And we just want the public to know that we're there to answer questions — anything that they see on the news or have questions about. That's what our office is there to do is to answer those questions.
Jennifer Price is the elections director for Washington County.
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