Cast Your Vote

Student Worksheet: 
Build Your Own Voting Machine

You are a team of engineers who have been given the challenge of designing a reliable voting machine for your classroom.  Your machine must be able to accept at least 20 votes, and accurately record the results.  In addition, the votes must be able to be checked in real time…perhaps by a teacher or a team member viewing the machine from a different angle than the voter.

 Research/Preparation Phase

1. Review the various Student Reference Sheets.  

 Planning as a Team

2. Your team has been provided with some "building materials" by your teacher.  You may ask for additional materials.

3. Start by meeting with your team and devising a design and materials plan to build your machine.  Think about how the voter will interact with your design. Will it be sturdy enough to handle the votes of 20 people and still maintain accuracy? You'll need to figure out what building materials you require, and develop a sketch of your plan for review by your teacher.  Remember, there is no "correct" design.  Engineers come up with all sorts of designs to reach the same goal -- your design will be unique because your group did it!

4. Write or draw your voting system design in the box below or on another sheet.  Include a list of materials you plan to use to build the instrument. Present your design to the class. You may choose to revise your teams' plan after you receive feedback from class.  

	
Materials Needed:

	
      Cast Your Vote

Student Worksheet (continued): 

 Construction Phase

5. Build your voting machine.  Test it within your group to make sure it accurately records your own votes.  Come up with a plan for recording the results.     

 Cast Your Votes

6. Each student team will have a chance to vote on the other team's machines/systems.  Be sure to respect the systems other teams have developed in the same way you want them to respect yours.  As you vote on another machine, keep a record of how you personally voted on each issue.  You will also be asked to take an "exit poll" which will allow teams to determine the accuracy of the votes taken.

 Evaluation Phase
7. Evaluate your teams' results, comparing your teacher's notes on what the votes were to those gathered in your system.
8. Complete the evaluation worksheet, and present your findings to the class.

 Use this worksheet to evaluate your team's results in the Cast Your Vote lesson:

1. Did you succeed in creating a voting machine that could accurately record at least 20 votes?  What was your percentage of accurate votes?  If you did not reach 100%, what caused the errors?

2. Did you need to request additional materials while building your machine?  

3. Do you think that engineers have to adapt their original plans during the manufacturing process of products?  Why might they?

4.  How did engineers adapt voting machines over time?  What prompted some of these changes?

Student Worksheet: Evaluation (continued)

5. If you had to do it all over again, how would your planned design change?  Why?

6.  What designs or methods did you see other teams try that you thought worked well?

7.  Do you think you would have been able to complete this project easier if you were working alone?  Explain…

8.  Can you imagine a way that voting might be conducted in the year 2080? 

9.  Do you think internet voting is a good idea for national elections?  Why or why not?
(Think about security issues, tampering of votes, etc.)

10.  What engineering considerations are needed in voting systems accommodate physically challenged voters?