This year a close presidential election and a push for public schools to encourage citizenship among students has led to heightened interest in the program.

Some schools have organized rallies, set up voting booths or taken classes to the computer lab to vote at kidsvotinghawaii.org. Others have given their students voter registration tokens to vote at home or at the polls with their parents.

As of yesterday afternoon, 69,289 students from 278 schools had voted. In 2002, more than 58,000 children participated.

With 6,000 to 11,000 kids casting votes each day, participation could reach 100,000, Coble said.

Le Jardin Academy has made one of the biggest efforts to get their kids engaged in voting, with a school-wide rally where children educated one another and their parents about election issues.

"The presidential election is only every four years and this year we wanted to get the kids pumped up and involved because it's a close race," said Brandy Sato, a fifth-grade teacher and social studies department head for the lower school.

Part of their motivation was to have children encourage their parents to vote, she said.

The school has made sure their students made informed choices by doing electoral college activities, having local candidates visit the school, watching the presidential debates and participating in other activities.

Kea Olaso, a fifth-grader at Le Jardin, said the rally was a fun way to learn about the election, since students gave speeches as President Bush, John Kerry and Ralph Nader, performed skits and sang election-related songs.

She said it was difficult to decide who to vote for, but she was able to make her choice for president off the information presented in class. "I voted for Kerry," she said.

Her fellow fifth-grader Kristina Millar comes from a Republican family, but she said she based her vote for Bush on what she has learned about him through school, not his party affiliation. "I think Bush is going to be a good president," she said.

While the big crowd at the rally was intimidating, Millar thinks the activity was important. "I think it's good for the kids to get involved because then they can vote and let their voice be heard and stuff," she said.

At Mililani Middle School, social studies teachers have also had their children vote in class.

The students prepared to vote by using a special Kids Voting curriculum and reviewing news articles about political issues. Students have also been encouraged to attend rallies this weekend featuring Vice President Dick Cheney, former Vice President Al Gore and Kerry's daughter, Alexandra.

Principal Caroline Wong said the school has participated in Kids Voting in previous election years, but she is not surprised by the increased participation this year, as the percentage of students voting will be used to help determine whether schools are meeting the state standards for citizenship.

Wong feels that community service and service learning programs should also be considered ways to meet the standards, but Kids Voting has its place.

"I think it's important for kids to do it," she said. "It's part of being a good citizen and being engaged in the community.