Ron Paul is 76 years old. His hair is gray, with a little bit of black, but not too much. He’s skinny but feisty, and he tends to point a lot. If elected, he will be the oldest president to set up shop in the Oval Office.

And although he is old enough to be many students’ grandfather, Paul’s libertarian stances on issues — he wants to eliminate the income tax, much of America’s foreign involvement and the war on drugs — have cultivated an active contingent of college-aged supporters both on and off the campus.

With this state’s presidential primary just two months away, this university’s chapter of Youth for Ron Paul has already put in many hours rallying support to help Paul win the Republican presidential nomination. Members of this university’s chapter of Youth for Ron Paul have stood outside of McKeldin Library, Stamp Student Union and the North Campus Diner handing out campaign materials and gathering signatures — 632 thus far, the eighth-most among university chapters on a petition to bring the candidate to the campus in March.

Paul — a 12-term Texas congressman who also ran for the Republican nomination in 2008 and was the Libertarian Party’s nominee 20 years before that — has attracted considerable youth support nationwide. Exit polls from the New Hampshire primary and Iowa caucuses, where Paul finished second and third respectively, showed Paul earning support from nearly one-in-two voters ages 18-24.

Although former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been viewed as the Republican frontrunner for most of the nominating process, members of the group said that hasn’t stopped their campaign. Since the start of the semester, they have amped up efforts to educate students about Paul’s candidacy. His views on social and foreign policy issues have gained attention.

“Most of the college students that I’ve spoken with, the main thing that really sticks out for Ron Paul is the war, ending the war on ‘terror,’ ending the war on drugs,” said Paul Rowe, the chapter’s secretary. “But then when I talk to older people, graduates that I know, or my parents, the main thing is the Fed — financial regulation.”

Such on-campus support for Paul isn’t new. In the 2008 Republican primary, Paul received 18 percent of votes cast at Stamp, according to data from the state board of elections, and in October of that year, Students for Liberty sponsored an event on the campus where Paul spoke in a Comcast Center auxiliary gym in support of several state congressional candidates.

But some students have stopped by the group’s tables to debate.

“We’ve had a couple of people who have stood for hours refuting what it is that we’re trying to say,” said Rowe, a junior government and politics major, adding that the overall response has been “enormously positive.”

Paul’s 2012 campaign has garnered considerably more support than his 2008 effort did; he more than doubled his share of the vote in each of the first four Republican contests. Rowe attributes Paul’s rise to worsened economic conditions and the state of the Republican field.

“Not that Ron Paul is a second choice in any sort of the phrase, but when people I know look at Mitt Romney, people always say crook; when people look at Rick Santorum they think radical; when people look at Newt Gingrich they think hypocrite, but when they look at Ron Paul, they think truth, common sense,” Rowe said.

Despite the university population’s liberal leanings — President Barack Obama received more than 80 percent of the general election vote at the student union’s polls in 2008 — members said they feel comfortable campaigning on the campus

“People are more open-minded than I used to give them credit for,” said junior government and politics major Matt Parsons, a member of the group’s executive board.

But some students, such as sophomore economics and mathematics major Alejandro Perez-Segura, said while they may agree with some of Paul’s views, he’s not the candidate for them.

“I think the field is overall pretty weak, but Ron Paul’s a pretty interesting guy,” he said. “I think some of his views are pretty awesome in some ways, but he’s a little too principled and little too extreme in some ways.”

knobel@umdbk.com