When Good Things "Go Viral"

If you enjoy this site, you might think I'm cool, or at least that the things that interest me are cool. I’m sorry to share bad news, but I’m really not: I’m a painfully earnest mom who’s active in her community and whose greatest passion in life is empowering others through education and social justice, specifically through math education. I also have a daughter who is almost thirteen, which means I am reminded daily of how uncool I am.

One thing my daughter and I have in common, though, is that we are deeply interested in politics. These days, we’re following political news closely, talking about history and social movements, and digging into local issues on the ballot. And two nights ago, we had a MOMENT together! More than a moment, really, and it involved politics AND math! She professes to not like math, but this is proof that when you start with what kids care about, you can get traction … big time. So much so that you might find yourselves sketching graphs in the kitchen.

Regardless of party affiliation or political ideals, we can all agree that the integrity of any democracy depends upon the people’s ability and inclination to exercise their right to vote. (If we can’t agree about that, let’s talk after class …) So I was pleased when my daughter told me how excited she was that a political figure she admires was going on a very popular social-gaming platform to connect with young people in an effort to get out the vote.

With my daughter’s help, I got onto the platform to watch. I was cooking dinner, and she was nearby on a device too. As the number of viewers continued to increase, my daughter would shout out the new numbers (and I’d write them on our grocery list whiteboard). I noticed that the numbers were high and increasing … and probably not at a steady rate. Earlier in the day, she’d shown me some class work about graphs (thank you, Desmos!), so I knew she’d recently been thinking about graphs and different kinds of curves.

We kept watching. And that is not what happened. Awesome: we have a chance to revise our thinking! Or, well, update our thinking with new information.

Instead, the number of viewers kept going up. She told me that she had also connected with a few friends and they were watching now too. I said, “Wait, if a lot of other people do that too … like each person gets three other people to watch and so on … this is going to get pretty enormous really quickly!” This is what we mean by “going viral,” after all … the numbers (of infected, or in this case interested, people) increase slowly at first and then rapidly skyrocket. These days, that phrase has ominous contours: we do not want each person who contracts the COVID-19 virus to share it with three other people and so on. But when it comes to something like spreading the word about how important it is that each of us votes, “going viral” can be a very good thing!

We had to seek out new towns for comparison as the number of viewers grew, approaching half a million people. Now, let’s say half of those viewers voted and each one convinced a friend to vote as well … that’s half a million votes. In some races in some locations, that is more than enough votes to change the outcome of an election. The takeaway: yes, your vote and your neighbors’ votes matter. When we vote together, we have power. Also: graphs are a powerful way to represent data to tell a story and support an argument.

NOTE Whatever your political affiliation is, whatever your views are, my family and I hope you are finding reliable, thoughtful sources of impartial information about the candidates and issues on your ballot. More than anything, we hope that you and your neighbors are unfettered in your ability to exercise your right to vote: in this election and in every election. If you want information about voting in your state, Vote411 might be a good start.

Vote411.org
Launched by the League of Women Voters Education Fund (LWVEF) in October of 2006, VOTE411.org is a "one-stop-shop" for election related information. It provides nonpartisan information to the public with both general and state-specific information ...