Directions Give yourself 3 minutes to read the passage Reading Time 3 minutes Critics say that current voting systems used in the United States are inefficient and often lead to the inaccurate counting of votes Miscounts can be especially damaging if an e

Directions: Give yourself 3 minutes to read the passage.
Reading Time: 3 minutes

Critics say that current voting systems used in the United States are inefficient and often lead to
the inaccurate counting of votes. Miscounts can be especially damaging if an election is closely
contested. Those critics would like the traditional systems to be replaced with far more efficient
and trustworthy computerized voting systems.
In traditional voting, one major source of inaccuracy is that people accidentally vote for the
wrong candidate. Voters usually have to find the name of their candidate on a large sheet of
paper containing many names—the ballot—and make a small mark next to that name. People
with poor eyesight can easily mark the wrong name. The computerized voting machines have an
easy-to-use touch-screen technology: to cast a vote, a voter needs only to touch the candidate’s
name on the screen to record a vote for that candidate; voters can even have the computer
magnify the name for easier viewing.
Another major problem with old voting systems is that they rely heavily on people to count the
votes. Officials must often count up the votes one by one, going through every ballot and
recording the vote. Since they have to deal with thousands of ballots, it is almost inevitable that
they will make mistakes. If an error is detected, a long and expensive recount has to take place.
In contrast, computerized systems remove the possibility of human error, since all the vote
counting is done quickly and automatically by the computers.
Finally some people say it is too risky to implement complicated voting technology nationwide.
But without giving it a thought, governments and individuals alike trust other complex computer
technology every day to be perfectly accurate in banking transactions as well as in the
communication of highly sensitive information.

Directions: Here is the transcript.
Narrator Now listen to part of a lecture on the topic you just read about.
Professor While traditional voting systems have some problems, it’s doubtful that
computerized voting will make the situation any better. Computerized voting may
seem easy for people who are used to computers. But what about people who
aren’t? People who can’t afford computers, people who don’t use them on a
regular basis—these people will have trouble using computerized voting
machines. These voters can easily cast the wrong vote or be discouraged from
voting altogether because of fear of technology. Furthermore, it’s true that
humans make mistakes when they count up ballots by hand. But are we sure that
computers will do a better job? After all, computers are programmed by humans,
so “human error” can show up in mistakes in their programs. And the errors
caused by these defective programs may be far more serious. The worst a human
official can do is miss a few ballots. But an error in a computer program can result
in thousands of votes being miscounted or even permanently removed from the
record. And in many voting systems, there is no physical record of the votes, so a
computer recount in the case of a suspected error is impossible! As for our trust of
computer technology for banking and communications, remember one thing:
these systems are used daily and they are used heavily. They didn’t work
flawlessly when they were first introduced. They had to be improved on and
improved on until they got as reliable as they are today. But voting happens only
once every two years nationally in the United States and not much more than
twice a year in many local areas. This is hardly sufficient for us to develop
confidence that computerized voting can be fully trusted.

Directions: Give yourself 20 minutes to plan and write your response. Your response is judged
on the quality of the writing and on how well it presents the points in the lecture and their
relationship to the reading passage. Typically, an effective response will be 150 to 225 words.
You may view the reading passage while you respond.

Response time: 20 minutes
Question: Summarize the points made in the lecture, being sure to explain how they cast doubt
on specific points made in the reading passage.