on campus
It helps educate the community. But mainly, it’s just kind of fun.
Political fortune-teller Opinion polls may be the nearest thing to a crystal ball this side of Middle Earth, but in a seat-based system like Canada’s they’re not very good at predicting actual election results, since seat counts often diverge widely from popular vote percentages (just ask the Green Party). That’s where the work of Barry Kay, a Laurier political science professor and associate of the Laurier Institute for the Study of Public Opinion and Policy, comes in. Kay uses a statistical method he devised, the “regional swing seat model,” to translate raw polling data into seat projections, often with eerie accuracy. Kay’s system divides the country into six regions with distinct voting patterns, then factors in changes in the polls in each region since the last election to come up with projected seat totals. (The model can also account for the impact of incumbency, since incumbent candidates can give their parties a three- to four-per-cent boost in their ridings.) Kay, who’s always had a knack for recognizing patterns in numerical systems, first came up with the model in the
1980s, and since then his projections have been featured in media outlets such as The Waterloo Region Record, Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail and CTV. (On election nights he has worked exclusively with Global Television since 2004.) Over the last 16 federal elections, the model has been accurate to an average of four seats per party. “The projection is only as accurate as the polls,” Kay says, adding that he uses a “bouillabaisse” of data from various reputable pollsters. “If the polls are off, then the projection is going to be off.” With the federal election and several provincial elections in 2011, Laurier’s Political Science department had over 300 calls from the media, and Kay himself fielded more than 150. He analysed the federal and Ontario elections using the regional swing seat model, and also ran Global’s decision desk, employing teams of Laurier students to call ridings as the actual numbers came in from polling stations. “It helps educate the community,” he says of his sideline in political fortune-telling. “But mainly it’s just kind of fun.” ❖
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