Students Close Out Registration Drives

More than 5000 Cambridge college students met the October 11 deadline to register to vote in this fall's presidential election, local election officials said today.

"The presidential election is the election that students make a point of registering for," said Sondra Scheir, a member of the Cambridge Election Commission Board. "Since the first of January, 1093 students have registered at the campuses of Harvard, MIT and Lesley College."

Three different organizations worked to register students at Harvard. The Cambridge Election Commission (CEC), the Student Advisory Committee (SAC) of the Institute of Politics and Harvard-Radcliffe Hillel all completed fall registration drives this week.

SAC's absentee and local voter registration project started last spring in an effort to register students for the presidential primary elections.

More than 2000 students registered in Cambridge or in their home states with SAC's assistance, said project co-organizer Robert Speyer '91.

Tabling

This fall, SAC "tabled" in all of the houses and in the Freshman Union. The Business School, Law School and K-School were covered by the SAC voter registration drive, and CEC deputy registrar also manned tables in front of the Science Center.

Hillel launched its registration drive to oppose Question 5 on the Cambridge city ballot, which asks legislators from that district to support a resolution calling upon Congress to end U.S. military aid to Israel and support a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Question Five Drive

Forty-nine people were registered at Hillel last Tuesday,

"We postered the campus telling people about Question 5. Then we advertised at the Science Center and at the Freshman Union. Basically, we were complementing other voter registration efforts on campus," Chubin said.

A total of 45,000 people are registered to vote in Cambridge, a city of 86,000, according to CEC estimates. More than 11,000 have registered since January 1, 1988.