U.S. Election: Students Predict Victory for Biden
2020-11-02 Berlin/Lüneburg. More than 5,000 German and American students already know the outcome of the U.S. elections: Joe Biden is going to be the 46th President of the United States of America. At today's online closing event for the U.S. Embassy School Election Project 2020, students will give their predictions for the election outcome state by state. Biden will receive 334 electoral votes while Donald Trump is projected to only receive 204 of the 538 electoral votes. Joannis Kaliampos and Professor Torben Schmidt of the Institute of English Studies at Leuphana University Lüneburg co-developed the course content and learning design of the project. The nationwide school project was initiated by the U.S. Embassy.
Since the school year began, students in participating classrooms have dealt with the election in their English courses. Each participating class was assigned a U.S. state. The task was to determine the outcome of the election for 'their' state by examining the respective social issues and the candidates' statements. Their forecasts have been correct before and in previous years predicted the election outcome more accurately than many political polls in the USA or Germany.
This year, 195 courses submitted a forecast for their state shortly before the election, with each state being covered by multiple classes. The forecasts are not always unanimous, but a majority decision could be determined for each state. The students predicted Biden would win several key states, including Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Florida, all of which Trump carried in 2016.
The U.S. Embassy School Election Project 2020 is a continuation of precursors organized by the U.S. Embassy Berlin for the 2008, 2012, and 2016 presidential elections. The innovative project curriculum was developed by a project team from the U.S. Embassy, the Berlin-based educational non-profit LIFE e.V., and the Institute of English Studies at Leuphana University Lüneburg. With the support of the Transatlantic Outreach Program at the Goethe-Institut in Washington D.C., it was possible to network school classes with American partner schools and thus enable a direct transatlantic exchange of information in the election project.
Further information on the project and the election forecast at www.teachaboutus.org