I thought my days of going on field trips were over once I started college, but this past fall term, I was proven wrong. With the 2024 election in full swing, I was excited to take PS101: The 2024 Election, a political science special topics class taught by Prof. Mike Alvarez. As a political science double major (yes, Caltech does have humanities majors!), I was excited for the chance to dive into current events and politics—something most of my classes don’t typically cover. This course explored core topics related to elections, campaigns, and the research surrounding them. To my delight, it also included field work (field trips!) in the surrounding community, such as visits to local voting sites and a tour of LA County’s new ballot processing center.

On the first day of class, Prof. Alvarez started off with introductions–the usual, name, year, and major–and also asked us why we had chosen to take the class. While sometimes it feels as though Caltech students are solely focused on STEM, the wide range of responses highlighted students’ strong interest in becoming more informed about the election and their genuine interest in following politics and current events. Some students expressed that it would be their first election as an American citizen (how exciting!), while others from swing states like Texas explained that they’d experienced many of the challenges of voting by mail (and seen lots of campaign advertisements). Many of these students wanted to learn more about swing states from an academic/research point of view. Although Caltech requires all students to take advanced, writing-intensive humanities courses (like PS101), it was exciting to hear why people had chosen PS101 specifically.

During the first half of the class, we discussed voting technology (how it’s changed over the years), polling (why predictions are so difficult), and election security. Outside of class Prof. Alvarez had multiple talks (both in-person and online) with election officials and researchers during the first half of the term, and we got to attend many of them.

Voting in Action

Part 1: A Little Excitement

In the days leading up to the election, the class visited multiple early voting locations in LA County in small groups with either Prof. Alvarez or our grad student TA, Garrett. While I had been poll watching in a previous course, for many of the other students, this was be their first time. In California, so long as you don’t cause any disruption to the voting process or election officials, anyone can be a poll watcher.

On the day before the election, my group of five (four students and Garrett) first visited the voting site at the LA County Public Works Department, a massive office building (you can see it in the background of the parking lot picture below in Alhambra) about 15 minutes aways from campus.

When we arrived at the voting site around 9:30 A.M., the place was quiet—unsurprising as it primarily served LA County employees, most of whom were probably already at their desks. When we entered the voting room itself, the polling site lead approached us, curious about our presence. Once our Garret, our TA, explained that we were university students observing as part of a class, he was very polite and allowed us to stand in an open area off to the side. We began jotting down notes about the site’s setup — how many check-in stations there were, how the voting machines were arranged, how many doors entered the room — while carefully staying out of the way.

Not long after, a building security guard—not an election official—started asking us questions. Garrett, ever patient, calmly answered each inquiry. After a couple of back-and-forths, the guard walked off, and we thought the matter was settled.

Ten minutes later, however, the same guard returned and abruptly asked us to leave the building. Of course, we didn’t want to cause any disruption, so we complied and stepped outside to a nearby patio. Confused, we speculated about what had just happened. Why were we asked to leave when the poll site lead had been welcoming and even offered to answer any questions?

Eventually, a supervisor from building security came to ask us questions about what were doing (we were visiting location voting sites to see how early voting worked). His questions were polite. What were we doing there? (Observing how early voting worked.) What organization were we from? (Caltech!) What kind of data were we collecting? (Handwritten notes on voter traffic, wait times, room setup, and privacy.) While the supervisor seemed genuinely surprised that college students would be observing voting sites, he listened carefully. After our explanation, he asked us to wait while he consulted his superior.

As we continued waiting and wondering what would happen next, the first security guard reappeared about five minutes later. With an apologetic tone, he told us we were free to return inside. (Woo!) It turned out the confusion stemmed from building security being unaware that poll watching was completely legal. Nervous about our presence, they had overreacted. With everything cleared up, we headed back inside to continue our observations, relieved that the misunderstanding had been resolved. Phew!

We continued taking notes on the voting site (even the poll workers came over and asked us why we had all forced outside). The poll site lead told us that this location was typically busiest before working hours, between 8-9 A.M. and even more so after work, from 4:30 onwards. The large conference room had multiple ballot marking machines, but only four or five people had come in to vote while we observed. After 10 minutes, we headed back to the car (and all the security personnel were very nice to us on the way out!)

Part 2: A Little Voting Site

After this hubbub, we were all a bit apprehensive about what would happen at our next voting site, a nearby park’s community center. After a quick five minute drive over, we entered a small gym/community center, where, once again, the polling site lead asked us what we were doing. Upon hearing that we were poll watching, the site leader said we could stand anywhere off to the side (not in the way of voters or too close to them) and even gave us a booklet about poll watching!

This time, we had no interruptions as we watched about five people stream in to vote. The multi-purpose room seemed to double as a basketball court (a hoop stood off to the side) and an art room (kid’s drawings were hung on a side wall).

As a LA County resident myself, I had brought my completed mail-in ballot with me (there were 10 statewide propositions and multiple local ones, so the ballot was quite long) to drop off. As we exited the polling location, I was able to leave off my mail-in ballot signed, sealed, and delivered! I spent the rest of the day proudly wearing my “I Voted” sticker!

I voted! Selfie with the group after voting and poll watching!

While our group only visited two sites, altogether our class visited over 15 locations at community centers, libraries, and churches. Each voting site had it’s own quirks, but seeing the wide availability and number of early voting sites with people coming in to vote was democracy in action!

Watching Ballots Getting Counted! L.A. County Ballot Processing Center

The Thursday after the election, we went on our second field trip to the L.A County Ballot Processing Center in the City of Industry. At 9:30 A.M., the whole class piled into a bus (it’s been a long time since I last went on a bus with a class) and took a ~30 minute bus ride to the tour the Ballot Processing Center.

Very recently open (this past March), the ballot processing center was a massive warehouse-like space (if I remember correctly, we were told it was previously used as storage for a furniture company). The space was divided into different area, each for a step in the ballot counting procedure. Every ballot cast in LA County ends up at this expansive facility!

The place was bustling with activity, as over three million ballots needed to be counted and certified within 30 days of Election Day. First, ballots must undergo signature verification (as the signature is on the outside of the envelopes). Any signatures that don’t pass the digital or human verification check are then set aside for ballot curing (the process of trying to contact the voter to fix their signature). There was a whole separate part of the building that looked like a customer-service call center for this process.

The ballots that pass signature verification then go to the area for ballot extraction, where the ballots are taken out of their envelope and the voter’s identity is no longer attached to the ballot. There is a whole section for managing ballots that are torn, stapled together, or have liquids, like coffee, spilled on them (yes, apparently this happens quite often!).

The rest of the process is for the actual tallying of the election results, which is what we all wait eagerly for. For transparency purposes, the entire process is live-streamed for people to watch (though not sure who would spend hours doing that!), and people can also register as observers of the count. As we were given a tour around the machines that sort and arrange ballots before tabulation, we passed hundreds of employees hard at work.

Both our tour of the ballot processing center and seeing people voting at the voting sites were eye-opening reminders of the immense effort that underpins our democracy. Watching stacks of ballots being meticulously sorted and rows of workers ensuring every vote was counted accurately brought home just how much happens behind the scenes while we impatiently await election results on TV! It was both humbling and inspiring to see firsthand on our field trip the vast effort involved in making our voices heard. Democracy, after all, isn’t just about casting votes—it’s about the collective effort that ensures every vote is counted!