Students at AU are known for their top-ranking political awareness and activism on and off campus, but few, if any, can say they've run for mayor.
That's exactly what Nicole Burlew, 19, a student at Towson University, is doing right now.
A resident of Aberdeen, Md., Burlew isn't satisfied by the way things are run in her town and wants to see a change, she said. But the change she is looking for doesn't stop at property taxes or water issues; she wants more.
If elected, she will advocate for high school internships at local businesses, speed bumps where needed, loans to fix the water infrastructure, workers' permits for nonresidents, hotel taxes and resolutions to a variety of other problems in the city, according to Burlew's Web site.
The election hasn't happened yet, but Burlew is already seeing results. Her friends who have never bothered with an election now can't peel themselves away from watching the daily news on television, she said.
Several weeks into her campaign, she is still going strong and still acing exams despite all of the work that comes along with electioneering, she said. But what does she have to say about the undeniable adversity that she faces regarding her age?
"One response I received in a poll was that this person wouldn't trust a 19-year-old with the copier machine in his office," she said. "My response to that was, if 18-year-old teenagers can't work a copy machine, then why are they allowed to die and kill for this country?"
Many of her friends joined the Marines, Army and Air Force after graduation from high school, Burlew said.
"Isn't it sad to know that the lives that they kill for, the lives that they die for, think they shouldn't work a copy machine?" she said.
If elected, Burlew wouldn't have much company in other young elected officials. In 2002, less than 5 percent of elected officials were under the age of 35, according to a 2004 report from the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University. These officials included six members of Congress, two statewide elected officials, 321 state legislators and 485 municipal officials, according to the report.
Burlew faces incumbent Mayor S. Fred Simmons, an insurance salesman, and Michael Bennett, a retired state trooper, according to The Baltimore Sun.
Regardless of the election's outcome, Burlew already considers her campaign a victory.
"Teenagers are registering to vote just to vote [in] this election," she said. "People who have never voted in any election are going out and registering to vote so they can vote in this election. Whether they vote for or against me, the point is they voted"
