| At Grinnell College, only 13%, or about 200 of Grinnell's 1,500 students, are from Iowa. That leaves some 1,300 students from out of state (many of whom might be international students) to convince to come back early to caucus, given that the college does not reopen for spring semester until January 18th. The local chapters of College Democrats and Young Democrats of Iowa have been hard at work to "manipulate" the caucus, in the words of rival presidential campaigns, by, gasp, arranging carpools from places as distant as California and New York to get students back in time for the caucus. Chapter President Alec Schierenbeck expects “well over 100 students” to return to caucus on the Democratic side. Campus administrators have arranged to open a gym for students to camp out in their sleeping bags: Sarah Mirk, a Grinnell student from California, envisioned a utopia for a young lover of politics. “Dozens of students sleeping on the gym floor, unwinding from long road trips and talking politics,” she said.
Obama has by far the strongest campus organization, but the New York Times noted: Presidential candidates who have strong campus organizations include Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, at the University of Iowa, and Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, at Grinnell.
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