ABCS to Empower Student Unions with “Count on Our Vote” Campaign
The Alliance of B.C. Students will help member associations get their constituents to participate in May’s provincial election
The Alliance of B.C. Students is gearing up for a campaign to help student unions across British Columbia encourage their constituents to vote in the upcoming provincial election.
“The ABCS is planning for the election,” say Alex McGowan, chairperson of the ABCS and Kwantlen Student Association president. “We’re reaching out to other student societies, non-members, to see if they want to work with us.”
The ABCS is a non-profit advocacy group of graduate and undergraduate student societies, with members representing over 60,000 university and college students, including those at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. The motto for their upcoming campaign, which will launch on all member campuses on March 1, is “Count on Our Vote.”
“For us, the work really starts in February or even January, because we’re planning a lot and coordinating that,” says McGowan.
As part of the campaign, the Kwantlen Student Association will be registering students to vote and encouraging student to pledge to vote throughout the campaign. Upon pledging, the KSA will collect a student’s contact information and provide them with resources and information to ensure that they can vote, such as the location of the nearest polling station.
“[Pledging is] the core of the campaign,” says McGowan. “Hopefully it won’t just be the Alliance members running our provincial campaign, it will be larger.”
In tandem with the “Vote” campaign, the ABCS will also be conducting its annual “Lobby Day,” where their member unions and associations meet with MLAs. Over the past few years The Alliance has met with roughly half of the legislature, which is more than most lobby groups are able to accomplish.
“It’s a pretty powerful lobbying blitz,” says McGowan. “Everyone’s usually pretty impressed that we can do that.”
The ABCS usually meets with the BC legislature in the spring, but because of the upcoming election the “lobbying blitz” will most likely take place in the summer instead.
