USL’s exit polling of the Mount Pleasant municipal races and our history of accurate election predictions formed the main elements of the lead election story (“School’s exit poll predicts Linda Page will be Mount Pleasant’s next mayor“) for the Post and Courier on Election Night (November 5, 2013), and the results of the survey we administered were cited the following day in a story about the mayoral race results. USL’s survey and its results were discussed — especially the full-time mayor question — in a feature article on Linda Page(“From Just Passing Through, to Town Hall“) (November 10, 2013). Here is a feature story about our exit polling program from the Charleston City Paper (“Across Charleston County, students run a serious exit poll”).
Tuesday, November 5 was a special Learning Outside the Classroom day at University School of the Lowcountry. USL conducts exit polling for elections every November, and all of our students (we serve grades 3-9) take part. This year we focused on the municipal races in Mt. Pleasant. We chose eleven voting locations across the Town in order to have a representative sample of the Town as a whole. Our goal was to garner approximately 100 completed exit polls at each site. Every year we seek to expose our students to a wide array of voters, voting locations, and political perspectives, and typically this involves having each student go to two different polling locations. Unfortunately, municipal elections have low turnout, so we only go to one polling location so that we can stay long enough to get a sufficient number of completed exit polls. Although we spent over two hours at each location, we were not able to get 100 at most sites. We then returned to USL to compile the surveys and make informed predictions about the races.
This experience is an annual endeavor at University School of the Lowcountry because of the pattern of Congressional (and occasionally statewide and more) races in even-numbered years and municipal elections in odd-numbered years. 
The students have learned about the candidates, marketing, and the issues facing the community. Some even attended a “meet the candidates” luncheon that was sponsored by the Mt. Pleasant Business Association. They have also explored the value of exit polling in terms of statistics, sample size, location of precincts, turnout differences for different types of elections, and the diversity of voters they will encounter. These are great lessons for preparing our students to be active and informed participants in their country.
University School students administer exit polls to voters, including current Mt. Pleasant Mayor Billy Swails, at the National Guard Armory on Mathis Ferry Road.
Here are our predictions and survey results (full results are below this)
A. MT. PLEASANT MAYORAL ELECTION
– Linda Page wins and avoids a run-off with 57% of the vote. Of the 11 polling sites, Page won ten of them (and won over 50% of the vote at all of these sites).
– Joe Bustos is second (21%), Ken Glasson is third (18%), and George Freeman is fourth (4%).
B. MT. PLEASANT TOWN COUNCIL (4 Open Seats)
– Paul Gawrych (15.5%), Gary Santos (14.6%), and Elton Carrier (14.5%) win seats.
– The contest for fourth is too close to call among Mark Smith (12.7%), Ben Bryson (12.5%) and Anthony Kowbeidu (11.7%).
C. MT. PLEASANT WATERWORKS COMMISSION (2 Open Seats)
Rick Crosby (36%) and John Burn (28%) win seats.
D. SURVEY QUESTIONS
(1) The mayor of Mt. Pleasant should be this type of job (681 responses)
Full-time (69% or 473)
Part-time (30.5% or 208)
— This is in line with our survey results from the 2009 municipal elections when 71.5% of polled voters said the job should be full-time.
(2) What is the single most important problem facing Mount Pleasant (that is, the one you would like to see be resolved by the Mayor and Town Council)?
— 2009 results are in brackets
— In comparison to the same survey that was administered in 2009, Traffic/Transportation is still the #1 issue but the percentage of respondents selecting it fell sharply – from approximately half to approximately a quarter of all responses. The other marked movement came in Education/schools (up from 11% to 18%) and in economy/jobs/unemployment (falling from 22.2% to 14%).
26.6% Traffic/Transportation [46.2% in 2009]
18% Education/schools [11% in 2009]
14.1% Economy/jobs/unemployment [22.2% in 2009]
10.7% Taxes [10.9% in 2009]
6.8% Funding of municipal operations [7.2% in 2009]
5.6% Recreation [2.6% in 2009]
5.1% Environment [4.1% in 2009]
4.9% Services for Seniors/retirees [5.9% in 2009]
4.9% Open/transparent government [6% in 2009]
2.6% Crime [2.8% in 2009]
.5% Other [.5% in 2009]
(3) Please rate the following on scale of 1-10 (1 is the lowest and 10 is the highest)
8.8 The quality of life in Mt. Pleasant
7.3 Mt. Pleasant’s government
6.5 Charleston County’s government
5.9 South Carolina’s government
4 United States’ government
Full exit polling results
MT. PLEASANT MAYORAL ELECTION – OVERALL
Page 416 (56.9%) (actual 57.3%)
Bustos 155 (21.2%) (actual 19.6%)
Glasson 131 (17.9%) (actual 18.8%)
Freeman 27 (3.7%) (actual 3.9%)
Carroll 0 (0%) (actual .3%)
MT. PLEASANT MAYORAL ELECTION – BY VOTING LOCATION
National Guard Armory (Precincts 15 & 16)
Page 61, Bustos 18, Glasson 12, Freeman 5
Mt. Pleasant Park West Rec Center (Precinct 35)
– Glasson 26, Page 21, Bustos 19, Freeman 0
Moultrie Middle School (Precincts 6-9)
– Page 55, Bustos 23, Glasson 10, Freeman 4
Christ Episcopal Church (Precincts 22, 23, 24)
– Page 23, Bustos 10, Glasson 4, Freeman 2
Wando High School (Precincts 38 & 39)
– Page 27, Bustos 13, Glasson 9, Freeman 1
Jones Recreation Center (Precincts 26, 28 & 29)
– Page 31, Bustos 12, Glasson 9, Freeman 0
Mt. Pleasant Municipal Complex (Precincts 2, 4, 5)
– Page 63, Bustos 17, Glasson 13, Freeman 4
Trident Academy (Precincts 18 & 19)
– Page 31, Glasson 16, Bustos 7, Freeman 4
Alhambra Hall (Precinct 1)
– Page 38, Bustos 8, Glasson 1, Freeman 1
Greater Goodwill AME (Precincts 31, 32, 34)
– Page 37, Glasson 20, Bustos 13, Freeman 4
Brickyard Community Center (Precincts 30 & 36)
– Page 29, Bustos 15, Glasson 11, Freeman 2
MT. PLEASANT TOWN COUNCIL RACES (4 Spots) – OVERALL
(sorted by results gathered)
Paul Gawrych (370, 15.5%) (actual order – 1st – 15.8%)
Gary Santos (347, 14.6%) (actual order – 2nd – 15%)
Elton Carrier (344, 14.5%) (actual order – tie 3rd – 13.7%)
Mark Smith (302, 12.7%) (actual order – tie 3rd – 13.7%)
Ben Bryson (297, 12.5%) (actual order – 6th – 11%)
Anthony Kowbeidu (277, 11.7%) (actual order – 5th – 12.6%)
Joseph Wren (238, 10%) (actual order – 7th – 9.2%)
Timm Gipe (196, 8.2%) (actual order – 8th – 8.7%)
Other (9, .4%) (actual .4%)
MT. PLEASANT WATERWORKS COMMISSIONERS (2 Spots) – OVERALL
(sorted by results gathered)
Rick Crosby (379, 35.7%) (actual order – 1st – 34.6%)
John Burn (297, 28%) (actual order – 2nd – 27%)
Alys Campaigne (205, 19.3%) (actual order – 3rd – 20.2%)
Dolph Rodenberg (181, 17%) (actual order – 4th – 17.7%)
* 731 completed exit poll surveys from the following locations:
National Guard Armory, Brickyard Community Center, Moultrie Middle School, Christ Church, Wando, Greater Goodwill AME, Jones Recreation Center, Mt. Pleasant Municipal Complex, Trident Academy, Mt. Pleasant Park West Rec Center, and Alhambra Hall.
