The three presidential debates being held this year have three very different venues. The first debate, as we all know, is being held at our very own University of Mississippi on September 26 and will be featuring the topic of foreign policy. The second debate, held at Belmont University in Nashville, TN, will take place on October 7 and will be held as a town meeting format. The third and last will be held at Hofstra University in Hempstead, NY on October 15, discussing domestic policy. These are three very different schools and settings for these presidential debates.

Ole Miss, a seemingly conservative southern school, previously made famous for extreme racial issues in the ‘60s, will be watched closely for anything that resembles racism during the debate. It will be interesting to see how much the racial problems of the past will be brought up by the media during the debates—especially being the first debate with an African-American candidate in history. Belmont, a small liberal arts Christian college founded as a university in 1991 will be a major change of scenery in terms of the size of the campus. Being declared a Christian university, I’m waiting to see if Belmont will be seen as an ultra-conservative venue by the media as I feel like Ole Miss will be. Hofstra University, located about 25 miles from Manhattan, New York is quite a change from Oxford, Mississippi and Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1935, Hofstra is a private, nonsectarian university. Will Hofstra be portrayed as the liberal university of the three debates this year?

I’m ready to see how the media portrays each of the venues of the debates. Each site is quite different from the other, and each will represent a different section of the country.