Gabby DeMarchi
News Editor
On Wednesday night, Springfield College played host to WBZ’s Nightside with Dan Rea, where the big topic of the night was the 2012 Presidential Election.
Since the beginning of September, Rea and his team have been traveling to different college campuses in New England to run their program “Talk the Vote.”
“The idea is to take the radio show out of the studio. We still have callers, we still have guests like we normally would, and we have a studio audience, and it’s great. It’s a great way to get involved,” said Rea.
So far, “Talk the Vote” has been to Endicott College, UMass Boston, Mass. School of Law, and last night, SC.
“Talk the Vote” decided to come to SC because of the ties WBZ 1030 had with the Springfield area.
“We have a lot of listeners from the Springfield area,” Rea said. “WBZ started in Springfield way back in 1921, believe it or not.”
Last night’s event featured an elite group of panelists who have actively been following the election for months now.
Adriana Cohen, Republican Strategist and Analyst for Nightside put her two cents in for Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, while Nightside analyst, and former Democratic U.S. Senate candidate, Marisa DeFranco stuck to her guns and fought for President Barack Obama.
Also on the panel were Springfield College Professor and Social Sciences Department Chair, Tom Carty, American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) President, Rob Romasco, and AARP Senior Vice President for Policy, Cheryl Matheis.
Gabby DeMarchi
News Editor
The main focus of the event was to look at the election, but the panel also focused on issues that sponsor AARP primarily deals with.
“[We’re looking at] the debate, the election, maybe the Senate race as well, and we’ll be focusing on the issues that ARRP is particularly concerned about [like] Social Security and Medicare and funding for those programs,” explained Rea.
Throughout the event, Rea took questions from the live audience, as well as callers from all over the country.
Hard-hitting questions about the youth vote, voter fraud and the role of The American Independent Party were all looked at.
“Talk the Vote” helped promote awareness of the upcoming election while involving members of the community, as well as Springfield College students, faculty and staff.
“There hasn’t been much involvement on campus concerning the election, so it was nice to see the school making an effort,” senior Alison Dombroski said.
Rea and “Talk the Vote” will venture to Franklin Pierce University in New Hampshire next week.