Last week Bob Sarver held an online discussion during the presidential debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, enabling  his students to not only receive extra credit but also allow students who can’t vote to be involved in the presidential race.

“It came together well and got lots of people engaged in conversation,” Sarver said. “Spurred people to be interested in the debate when if the discussion was not available many would not have watch it.”

Through 6 hours of preparation Sarver put together an online debate that the students enjoyed and hoped for more online discussions for the presidential debates.

“I was able to learn the opinions of some of my friends, and without it I may have never had that opportunity,” an active participant in the online debate Sierra Purden said. “I started getting so emotional over a few of the issues mentioned in the debate because people would make ignorant comments without any factual information, but at the end of the day I had to remember not everyone has the same opinion I do.”

Purden is a strong supporter and defender of the Republican party and with the debate open to both parties there were many opposing positions on each comment.

“Obama is obviously going to win like why even try,” another active participant in the online debate Brady Kelsey said. “It was a great idea in theory to have the chat during the debate but once we actually did a lot people paid more attention to the chat rather than what was being said in the debate.”

By: Desiree Shields