Six thousand audience members, 90 degree heat and a call to make a choice.

This was the scene as a cardinal-and-gold-clad mass passed around water and listened intently to the third sitting president (preceded by Gerald Ford and Bill Clinton) to visit Iowa State. 

“Just over two months from now, for the first time in most of your lives, you will get the chance to pick a president,” said President Barack Obama on Central Campus on Tuesday, Aug. 28.

“When you step into that voting booth, the choice you make in that one instant is going to shape your country and your world for decades to come,” Obama said. “Your generation chooses which path we take as a country; your vote decides where we go from here.”

Those in attendance spent several hours, some arriving as early as 5 a.m., to hear the 44th president speak just after 1 p.m.

On a stage in front of Curtiss Hall, Obama — who claimed he would do his best to have a speech equal that of Paul Rhoads — hit nearly every political topic, from renewable energy to the economy, student loan programs, the war in Iraq and health care.

Obama has visited the state of Iowa 12 times since the start of his presidency, six of those times, including this event, have been in 2012.

“Iowa is one of the most competitive states,” said David Peterson, professor of political science. “There is not a lot of states in play in the middle, but we are definitely one of them.”

Iowa has only six electoral votes up for grabs, but the state is one of only a few that could still swing either way.

About 200 Obama volunteers, who remained tight-lipped on any details involving the day’s events, and Romney supporters, who gathered in front of Parks Library, spent the morning registering students to vote.

Peterson stated that with this election’s youth votes, there “might be less engagement, less connection and a less sort of excitement this time compared to four years ago.”

Obama asked all the youths present at the event to get active in the next two months and also said he is counting on all of them in the upcoming election.

“We knew that solving our biggest problems was going to take more than one year, one term or even one president, but we went ahead, and we got started. We know we’ve still got a lot of work to do to get where we need to be, but we are going to get there. I believe that, because I believe in you,” Obama said in his speech.

Obama discussed the fact that by July 1, Congress had passed a bill that kept interest rates on student loans from doubling from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent.

As president, Obama changed the student loan program in 2010, which made it so all student loans went through the Federal Direct Student Loan Program instead of through a bank. He also eliminated a student’s ability to get two Pell Grants in one year, which used to make it easier for students to receive funding to go to school in the summer as well.

Roberta Johnson, director of Iowa State’s financial aid office, said Obama eliminated a student’s chance to get two Pell Grants in a year because the Pell Grant program was “becoming unsustainable.”

According to the ISU Fact Book, the amount of money awarded through Pell Grants between 2009 and 2010 jumped from $21.6 million to 24.6 million.

Johnson said Gov. Mitt Romney, who was announced as the presidential nomination for the Republican Party at the GOP National Convention on Tuesday, was not clear on his plans for the student loan programs but that Paul Ryan has discussed restricting the Pell Grant program and restricting eligibility for receiving a Pell Grant.

“In America, higher education isn’t a luxury: It’s an economic necessity that every family should be able to afford,” Obama stated.

Obama also touched on what all he has accomplished while in office with the support of his voters.

“I said we’d end the Iraq War; we did. I said we would get Bin Laden; we did,” Obama said to cheers. “No one will ever again have to hide who they love in order to serve the country they love because your vote ended “Don’t ask don’t tell” once and for all; you made that change.”

Obama ended by encouraging his supporters to be involved in the campaign over the next two months and to make a “choice” on election night of where they wanted the country to go from here.

“I’m asking you one more time to do what we did, what young people all across the state of Iowa did four years ago; I’m asking you to believe. … We’ve come too far to turn back now; we’ve got more work to do.”

All classes in Curtiss Hall were moved to the Memorial Union for the day, which Wendy Wintersteen, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Science, said was “easy to accomodate.”

In terms of financial impact on Iowa State, the senior vice president for business and finance, Warren Madden, said the university will know the costs of the event in around the next 30 days.

Madden said the Obama campaign will be reimbursing the university for most costs and that they agreed to pay the rent of about $7,000 for using Curtiss Hall and Central Campus, a fee that would be the same for others who wish to use the space.

Madden does not believe there will be any substantial amount of cost to the university for the event.