ext Tuesday’s election will be the first presidential election for many students on the Hill.

And according to some, young voters could determine who occupies the White House.

Adam Alexander, the national communications coordinator for the New Voters Project, said it is difficult to determine the number of newly registered voters in the 18-24 demographic because some states register voters until election day.

But they are expecting a significant young-voter turnout at the polls.

“In terms of the numbers that our organization has registered, we do feel comfortable saying this is unprecedented,” Alexander said.

The New Voters Project is a nonpartisan organization that tries to get more people in the 18-24 demographic to vote.

The close presidential election in 2000 may have caused some voters to realize their votes do count, Alexander said.

Young voters haven’t always been well represented in pre-election polls.

During the 2000 election, Gallup did a random sample of polls it had done and found only 10 percent of likely voters who were polled were in the 18-29 age range, Alexander said.

Exit polls found that 17 percent of voters were in that age group.

College students are sometimes underrepresented in the polls because many of them use cell phones instead of home phones, Alexander said.

Though some Western students plan on voting next week, pre-election polls don’t determine who they’re voting for.

Bardstown sophomore Annesia Lamb said there are more issues that affect students in this election than in the 2000 election. But she picked the candidate she is voting for based on the presidential debates, and not the polls.

“I don’t pay attention to them” Lamb said. “Who other people vote for doesn’t bother me.”

Nashville freshman Anna Yontz said she thinks more students will vote on Tuesday. But pre-election polls probably won’t impact most people.

“I think it might influence some people more if they don’t know who they’re going to vote for,” Yontz said. “I’m going to vote for who I feel I want to vote for.”

Another reason why college students are underrepresented in pre-election polling is that they haven’t shown up to vote.

Saundra Ardrey, political science department head, said politicians haven’t always targeted areas of concern for young voters.

“College students have historically and traditionally not participated in great numbers in the electorate,” she said. “But perhaps that’s changing in this election since there’s been an effort by many groups to get out the vote.”

Issues such as the war in Iraq, the possibility of a draft and the economy may draw more young people to the polls, Ardrey said.

Though the 18-24 demographic is not specified in most pre-election polls, there have been polls done on the college demographic.

Harvard University’s Institute of Politics phoned more than 1,000 undergraduates in October to see why college students were voting.

According to the study, college students are looking forward to voting this year.

“Shattering the myth that all young people don’t vote, college students appear poised to vote in the upcoming election,” the poll states.

More than 80 percent of college students have indicated that they plan to vote.

But the Harvard study states that the number of people who say they are voting is often higher than the actual turnout. The study states that 60 percent of college-aged voters are expected to show up at the polls.

And though younger voters often seem underrepresented in pre-election polls and in the voting booths, college students have picked the winning candidate in virtually every election since the voting age was changed to 18 in 1971, Alexander said.

“I think there are going to be enough young people going to the polls to have an impact,” he said.

This year Western has registered over 250 voters.

“I think more students registered because we targeted them,” Ardrey said. “We’ve been putting the issues in terms that are relative for their lives.”

Reach Beth Wilberding at news@wkuherald.com.