Electoral education of youth: Chairman of the CEC noted the importance of the new laboratory in Brest College

Chairman of the CEC of Belarus Igor Karpenko arrived in Brest on a working trip. One of the points of the program was a visit to the educational laboratory of electoral law and legal education, opened in April of this year on the basis of the Brest branch of the College of Business and Law, the correspondent of sb.by reports.

The laboratory is designed for practice-oriented training of students of the specialty “Jurisprudence” and increasing the electoral literacy of young people. The room is equipped with cabins for secret voting, stationary and portable boxes, an information stand, stencils for self-filling the ballot by blind and visually impaired citizens, multimedia equipment, educational models of documents and interactive educational materials, as well as other elements necessary for modeling the work of the polling station. On the basis of the laboratory, there is an electoral literacy club “Choose WILL #SHER”, where students themselves develop games, conduct excursions and training classes.

- I am convinced once again that the creative thinking of our youth helps to find new approaches. They can be effectively used both in the legal education of future voters and in the preparation of potential election organizers.

Taking into account its profile and the presence of the specialty “Jurisprudence”, the institution carries out deep, substantive work. This experience needs to be studied and scaled up in detail. Individual materials can be systematized and presented for use by other educational institutions.

- Any system should develop, so we plan to propose to include our initiatives in the legislative activity plan for next year. The proposed changes will not be conceptual and will not come as a surprise to the political process. We want to assess the rationality of using budget funds – for example, stationary cabins are much more expensive than portable screens, which are widely used in other countries. In addition, it is important to reflect in the legislation the institution of electoral volunteering. In the presidential election, there were more than ten thousand volunteers – they helped disabled citizens, commissions, accompanied international observers. Young people tend to understand the electoral system and participate consciously in elections, and this only strengthens legal literacy.

Head of the Electoral Literacy Club Tatyana Shchetinkina noted that the laboratory has become an important platform for practical training of future lawyers and educational work with the youth of Brest.

- We simulated a full-fledged polling station so that young people could see the voting procedure in reality - fill out a ballot, put it in a drawer, understand the organization of the space. This helps to create a responsible attitude towards elections. The laboratory has become the home of the “Choose WILL #SHER” club, where future lawyers explain complex legal concepts in simple language and involve peers through games, quizzes and excursions, she stressed.

- At the club, I learned much more – how to ensure a barrier-free environment and safety, and how to organize voting in medical institutions. I like to explain this to students and kids who don't study law. For a future lawyer, such immersion is important. All interactives we create ourselves - invent, design, conduct. Most of all, I like the game where we throw dice, walk chips and answer questions of varying complexity. It's fascinating and useful.