Boston University Student Union Vice President for Student Affairs Carl Woog traveled to South Carolina last week to recruit African-American voters to the Democratic Party.

As the Get Out the Vote coordinator for South Carolina’s Georgetown County, Woog, a College of Arts and Sciences junior, hires and oversees workers to knock on doors and make phone calls encouraging the public to vote for Democrats. He said his division focuses primarily on contacting African-American voters, 92 percent of whom vote Democratic.

Like many other political officials and representatives who have flocked to South Carolina over the past weeks to work with their respective parties, Woog traveled to the state due to the important role South Carolina plays in election results.

‘South Carolina is a pivotal state in the election process; it being the third primary. A lot of candidates around the country are taking special interest in South Carolina,’ Woog said.

Michael Moffo, former Student Union President and current GOTV director, invited Woog to South Carolina. Following Moffo’s graduation in 2002, Woog introduced him to a team of political workers in South Carolina. A year later, Moffo asked Woog to join him in the effort to increase voter awareness for the Democrats in South Carolina.

‘Now Michael needed people and asked me to come down, and I said I’d love to help out,’ Woog said.

He said the highly successful campaigning model his organization utilizes involves a brand-new system of public contact.

‘We knocked on 4,650 doors and made 10,000 phone calls from Friday to Monday,’ he said. ‘Then today, we knocked on those same 4,650 doors and called those same 10,000 homes. So basically, you involve the people before the election and then call them again on Election Day to remind them to vote.’

According to Woog, county voting reports have shown the new model to be particularly lucrative in gaining the African-American voting population.

‘This has been overwhelmingly productive and successful. Most counties are experiencing more African-American voter turnout than ever before,’ Woog said.

What separates the South Carolina voting experience from most other states’ is the information requested of individuals on the voting ballot itself, Woog said. Instead of asking voters to declare their party loyalties, the ballot asks the voter to state his or her race.

‘That’s a little-known fact about South Carolina. If I vote, I don’t say, ‘I’m a Democrat,’ or, ‘I’m a Republican.’ I say, ‘I’m white,’ or, ‘I’m black.’ So that’s the kind of information we have to go by here,’ Woog said.

He said his organization’s practice of targeting one particular demographic for votes is in no way unprincipled.

‘I don’t want to run the risk of sounding Machiavellian,’ Woog said. ‘That 92 percent is an accurate indicator of Democratic voters. The African-American population is an underrepresented minority in all election positions. We’re trying to raise voter awareness.’