By Web Editor Admin

Only 65 University students registered to vote at a free concert sponsored through the national “Rock the Vote” initiative.

The concert, which was held Wednesday night at Hofstra USA, featured a local tri-state band, Braking Laces.

Braking Laces tried it’s hardest to rally those attending the event by holding their own mock election on who was the ‘hottest’ band member.

Planned Parenthood of Nassau County and various University organizations, including Entertainment Unlimited and Women of Action, locally sponsored the event.

The organizers, who had high expectations for the concert and hoped to register as many people to vote as possible, provided the small audience with absentee ballots and new voter applications.

“As young people we are the first to complain,” Mia Fields-Hall, the Rock the Vote east coast director said. “Don’t complain if you don’t do anything about it.”

According to Fields-Hall, one of the reasons new voter registration has jumped to an all time high, is because celebrities show younger voters, “voting is cool and sexy.”

Fields-Hall stated the Rock the Vote campaign is not just about music and celebrity, but also about sharing opinions.

“We decided we wanted to do something to really mobilize the college age group,” Tannisha Brooks, a graduated student in the health administration program and the original organizer of the event said.

“Usually if they’re going to vote, it’s going to be for the president,” Brooks said about why she felt this was the right time to start a new voter registration campaign.

The organizers encouraged student to fill out their absentee ballots and register even if they were not in the designated swing states.

“You need to get in the habit of doing it now,” Brooks said.

Brooks had wanted to hold the event on campus for a long time and only after the local sponsors agreed to the concert was the Rock the Vote logo attached as a bonus.

Though the numbers for the event were low the event did see 120 people come through the door, many according to Brooks, were already registered to vote.

“Since we have 12,000 students, I would have preferred that they would have been a little higher,” said Brookes.

Only a handful of students showed up at the Rock the Vote event Tuesday. (Eric Blankenbaker)