News Reporter
C-SPAN’s 2012 Campaign Bus parked on campus Tuesday to inform students about the upcoming presidential election.
“We want visitors to know how we’re funded, what we show, and more importantly, to engage visitors with all of our online resources,” C-SPAN Marketing Representative Jennifer Curran said. “The bus is a multi-media demonstration center meant to be interactive. There are four touch-screen kiosks that you can take trivia quizzes on. You can look through our large video library website. You can find out more information about candidates. You can connect with us through Facebook, YouTube and Twitter on tablets.”
C-SPAN has had a traveling bus since 1993. Curran said they have 10-11 events per week, 10 months out of the year. They visit book festivals, state capitols, city halls, libraries and political events.
The bus visited Mesa County because Fruita Monument High School senior Vinny Castellini won third place in C-SPAN Classroom’s StudentCam Documentary contest. After visiting FMHS, C-SPAN came to CMU wanting to show students that they are student-friendly.
Curran said that C-SPAN doesn’t encourage voting.
“If our visitors choose to vote or not, that’s up to them,” Curran said. “Our function is to provide public access to what’s going on in Washington, D.C. It’s important for citizens to have public access to their government.”
Curran said that C-SPAN is nonpartisan.
“We keep everything balanced,” Curran said. “Our morning show has three phone lines open: one for an independent, one for a democrat and one for a republican. We have a Facebook page that allows people to post comments that aren’t censored based on what political parties are mentioned. We ask ourselves, ‘Did we cover a republican event earlier today? If we did, we need to make sure to make it to a democrat event if possible.”
C-SPAN has been nonprofit since it began in 1979.
“We are funded by our cable affiliates,” C-SPAN Marketing Representative Jenny Marland said. “About 6-7 cents of every cable bill goes to C-SPAN.”
CMU senior Caroline Dowd said she enjoyed the bus.
“I don’t have a TV, so I’m based on my smart phone now,” Dowd said. “Because of the bus visit, I now know that C-SPAN has an app. That’s good because voting is important.”
To find out more about C-SPAN, go to www.c-span.org.
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