How does the practice of

gerrymandering make you feel about

voting in the future?

Quick-write
What would be the best way to divide your town or city
into 4-5 areas with roughly the same amount of people
in each? For example, would you use larger streets as borders or rely on areas that already
exist, like school enrollment districts or different neighborhoods?

The best way to divide Merced into 4-5 areas with around the same amount of people is to
divide the North, east, south, and west. It would be a good way of keeping people in the
same area in the same district but I think the population might be off because certain areas
have more people living there.

Watch first and test your knowledge Video

● 0:55: Define ‘gerrymandering’ in your own words.
Political manipulation of electoral district boundaries with the intent of creating undue
advantage for a party
● 2:03: How often to congressional districts get redrawn? What are the two official rules
governing how districts are redrawn?
They are redrawn every 10 years.
● 2:43: Who usually is in charge of drawing congressional districts? What do they do to
help a certain political party stay in power?
State legislature draws the new districts, but some states have established
redistricting commissions
● 4:05: Define “cracking” and “packing” in your own words.
 When they divide the political parties so one political party does not have a chance.
Packing is concentrating the opposing party's voting power in one district to reduce
their voting power in other districts
● 4:53: What are two ways to make redistricting more fair?
Draw lines instead of drawing weird insect looking shapes.

Take notes:

Evidence that gerrymandering Evidence of ways to limit the How this evidence makes me
affects the outcomes of some effects of gerrymandering feel about voting in the
elections future?

They draw district lines depending
on what political party is in charge
and manipulate the boundaries of
so as to favor one party or class.
Ways to limit gerrymandering
is to redraw the districts every
few years and to also stop
having political parties drawing
the lines.
It makes me not really want to
vote because although the
election hasn’t happened the
winner has already been
decided based on how the
district lines have been drawn.

Write your opinion on how gerrymandering makes you feel about voting in the future.
It makes it feel like my vote would not count so what’s the point in doing so.