As a particularly controversial election season enters its homestretch, Washington University is preparing to play a major role in some of 2016’s history-making moments. Pulling off an event like this is no small feat, but as a five-time host, the University has a pretty good idea of what it takes—and what it offers to its students.

With each debate comes a unique set of challenges that depends in part on the candidates and their platforms. Though the University plays no direct role in politics, administrators are tasked with anticipating and preparing for anything that might come to pass: be it withdrawals, third-party candidates or security concerns.

Donald J. Trump addresses his supporters at the Peabody Opera House on March 11, 2016. As the Republican presidential nominee, Trump will presum- ably return to St. Louis in October to debate Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in the newly constructed Athletic Complex.

What if?

Many have questioned Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s presence at upcoming debates, but recently his campaign representatives insisted that he will show up. There is also the possibility of a third-party candidate joining Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and Trump on stage for the debates—if he or she can reach 15 percent in the polls. If only one candidate agrees to show, there is no debate.

But the University’s job as a host is to make sure that, despite any and all uncertainty, it can provide a smooth operation. There simply is no guarantee from the debate commission that the show will go on, and in the case of a cancellation, the University will lose a large amount of time, effort and resources.

This happened to Washington University in 1996, when a decision was made to host only two presidential debates after accepting bids for three hosts.

“We don’t have any control over it, so all we can do is be ready,” Steve Givens, associate vice chancellor and chair of the debate committee, said. This is Givens’ fifth time spearheading debate preparations.

The buzz

With an event of this magnitude comes a daunting fleet of media members. In the days leading up to the debate, various networks will be broadcasting live from posts around campus: MSNBC will be on the side of Graham Chapel, Fox by Mudd Field, and other networks too, according to Givens.

“They’re looking for stories to do, and we have experts. We have historians and political scientists and economists who can address the issues of the day, so it gives us a chance to put our faculty and our students on local, regional, national and international television,” Givens said.

He recounted a group of engineering students who were featured on multiple news outlets after constructing and displaying a life-sized Palin vs. Biden Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots game. Students and groups looking to make a splash will have lots of opportunity with an incredible and sudden volume of media exposure.

“They can be a part of outdoor broadcasts, live broadcasts and often times they end up in the background footage or a pan. Certainly there are media who want to hear from students—there’s a reason these are on college campuses—about their opinions and their experience,” Stephanie Kurtzman, director of the Gephardt Institute for Civic and Community Engagement, said.

Cassie Klosterman, also an employee of the Gephardt Institute, works there as a voter engagement fellow. She noted there are lots of resources available to groups looking to design their own debate programming in whatever way they find most meaningful.

“It’s not about us saying, ‘this is what programming is going to happen’ and implementing it, it’s about us saying, ‘we have these resources available,’” Klosterman said. “So you decide what kind of programming is going to excite you and what’s going to engage your peers, and we can help build that.”

Not our first rodeo

The University hosted its first presidential debate in 1992, Clinton vs. Perot. Givens, tasked as debate chair both then and now, noted that the most significant changes in terms of debate preparation and logistics throughout the years are in technology and security.

“In ‘92, we had to set up banks of payphones and that’s how the vast majority of journalists filed their stories,” Givens said. “They wrote their stories, ran to the payphone and dictated it to someone in New York or Boston or whatever their home base was.”

Though less physically demanding than trucking in payphones, assuring sufficient Wi-Fi bandwidth for everyone takes a large and dependable connection.

“Now we have really sophisticated Wi-Fi and we’re upping the bandwidth so to speak, so we can handle the 3000 members of the media who show up here,” Givens said.

After the 1992 debate, Washington University went on to host presidential debates in 2000 and 2004, along with a vice presidential debate in 2008. Security concerns around debates have heightened significantly from 2000 to now—a change that comes from living in a post-9/11 world. The University works with the debate commission along with the Secret Service to establish the security infrastructure for the facilities.

“With the state of the world and the importance of security, it has kept getting more and more tight. Now you have to have not only a credential to get within the secure perimeter, which will be established, but it’s got a chip in it, it only belongs to you, you’ve got to have a photo ID. It’s grown in sophistication,” Givens said.

When historian and Assistant Professor of Education Michelle Purdy was elected as Student Union president for the 2000-2001 school year when she attended Washington University as an undergraduate, she didn’t know she would be a key player in the last pre-9/11 presidential debate, Gore vs. Bush. Her main security concerns weren’t mass shootings and suicide bombs, but securing ample space for student protesters.

“I’m sure it was in somebody’s mind—some sort of bomb or assassination attempts or things like that. But it wasn’t in the forefront of your mind,” Purdy said.

But Purdy, her team of student leaders and the University as a whole faced other uncertainties. The night before the debate was scheduled, then-Missouri Gov. Mel Carnahan died in a plane crash 35 miles south of St. Louis along with his son and campaign advisor.

“We didn’t know if the debate was going to happen,” Purdy said.

The debate was not canceled but the post-debate rallies throughout the city were.

Making it count

On the day of the 2000 debate, Purdy was gifted a journal by a mentor and was advised to write down her experiences throughout the debate so she could revisit them fondly later in life.

“One never thinks that you will meet a presidential candidate, but I did. [Bush] kept introducing me as the girl from Jackson, Mississippi. I met [former Secretary of State] Condoleezza Rice, an African-American who aids him and later she told me what an amazing job I did speaking,” Purdy wrote in her journal on Oct. 17, 2000, moments after meeting both former presidential candidates.

She emphasized the lasting impact the whole experience had on her and her peers, and encouraged students to take this up-close-and-personal opportunity to dig deeper and examine the issues of the day with more scrutiny and care than ever.

“Go beyond just the rhetoric that we see on television. Really begin to understand how American democracy works and all the issues that these presidential candidates are addressing, both domestic and internationally,” Purdy said.

She stressed the value in pushing yourself to see things from the other side.

“Reading why people support the candidate that you might not support. Understanding the other side of the argument—what other people are feeling and why. To really dig deeper beyond the theater of it all.”

Kurtzman noted that hosting the debate will open up a lot of meaningful discussion about topics beyond the large-scale political issues.

“Not everybody will like seeing how much money is spent, and seeing the emphasis on how things appear to the media, and such; or may not like the fact that the debate is being hosted here, or may not like the candidates. It’s a tool for conversation,” she said.

Klosterman aims to get more students registered to vote and believes that voter education is a huge component of that. For her, the upcoming debate is an incredible tool.

“Students will be learning about how the election process works and how they can have an impact on local to national elections,” Klosterman said. “It’s a great way for me to channel that excitement into actual voter turnout and future civic behavior.”

Like Kurtzman, Klosterman and Purdy, Givens understands what this type of exposure can mean to its students. That’s the driving idea behind a key debate tradition, established in 1992:

“Every single ticket we get goes only to students through the lottery system. And we really have held to that tradition—the chancellor doesn’t even get a seat,” Givens said. “We’ve never wavered from it.”