By J.F. Meils
For The Diamondback
Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton will square off in the first presidential debate at Hofstra University in New York on Sept. 26 at 9 p.m.
For University of Maryland students, the debate will be an opportunity to learn more about the candidates, witness history or to just hang out with friends. And if you’re looking for a place to take it all in, campus political groups are hosting a watch party in Stamp Student Union’s Hoff Theater
NBC’s Lester Holt is set to moderate the event, which will run until 10:30 p.m. without commercials. The debate will be broken up into six, 15-minute segments and focus on the following topics: “America’s Direction,” “Achieving Prosperity” and “Securing America,” according to the Commission on Presidential Debates.
University professors warn it’s important to consider how you watch the debates.
“They’re not really debates,” said communication professor Trevor Parry-Giles. “They are more like elaborate joint press appearances.”
And they shouldn’t necessarily be the reason you vote for one candidate or the other, Parry-Giles added.
“I’m not certain that evaluation is the end goal of watching the debates,” he said. “If nothing else, they should be used as an information tool.”
Historically, the debates haven’t led to the type of polling shift that decides an election, according to Real Clear Politics, whose current average of polls has Clinton in the lead by 3 percent.
But the debates can lead to small polling bumps, which could decide a close race. So the 2016 debates will matter if the race stays this close, Real Clear Politics said.
And so will how you watch them.
According to a study by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, 28 percent of 18-34 year-olds followed the 2012 presidential debates on social media.
This year, the debates will live-stream on a wider selection of sites than in 2012, including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Buzzfeed News and the Huffington Post.
“There are opportunities online to discuss, debate and note various facts,” said journalism professor Ron Yaros. “It’s constant audience feedback, and of course, the campaigns are watching social media feeds as well.”
Prior to the debate, both Facebook and Google supplied data to the moderators about common searches and posts they tracked regarding the election. College Debate 2016, a social media effort by delegates from 150 colleges nationwide to identify the issues important to students, will help source questions for the town-meeting-style debate on Oct. 9 at Washington University in St. Louis.
There will also be plenty of opportunities to “second screen,” or follow other sites, while watching the debates.
MIT’s Media Lab will operate a live dashboard that tracks Twitter traffic related to the election. Illinois State University’s Social Media Analytics Command Center will track a collection of social media outlets and present their results in a range of visuals.
But there are downsides to gorging on social media.
“It’s a matter of filtering the information,” Yaros said.
Regardless of how students watch, the most important part might be that they’re simply tuning in.
“Hopefully voters are watching these events and working to find out as much as they can in order to make a judgment,” Parry-Giles said.
DEBATE SCHEDULE:
First debate: Sept. 26 at Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York.
Format: Six timed segments/15 minutes each/candidates have 2 minutes to respond before opponent can counter-respond.
Vice Presidential debate: Oct. 4 at Longwood University, Farmville, Virginia.
Format: Nine timed segments/10 minutes each/each candidate has 2 minutes to respond before opponent can counter-respond.
Second debate: Oct. 9 at Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Mo.
Format: Town meeting/50 percent of questions from “citizen participants,” 50 percent from moderator based on “broad public interest” in “social media and other sources”/each candidate has 2 minutes to respond/1 additional minute for back-and-forth
Third debate: Oct. 19 at University of Nevada-Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nev.
Format: Same as first debate.
WHERE TO WATCH:
TV: All major television networks and cable news channels
Online: ABC News, Buzzfeed News, CBS News, CNN, C-SPAN, The Daily Caller, Facebook, Fox News, Hulu, Huffington Post, NBC, PBS, Politico, Telemundo, The Wall Street Journal, Twitter, Univision, Yahoo, YouTube.
