IUSA names Vote Hard car winner

Michella Taylor's Ford Probe is in dire need of repairs.\nBut it's doubtful she will make any of them. She won't have to -- she's got a corvette.\n"I just got home in my corvette," Taylor said in a phone interview with the Indiana Daily Student. "It runs great."\nTaylor, 31, was told Wednesday afternoon she won the cream and crimson corvette through the IU Student Association's "Vote Hard" project's car giveaway. \nTaylor said she was aware of the contest, but said the announcement surprised her.\n"I never thought I had a chance of winning it," she said. \nIUSA initially announced the corvette contest in early September in an effort to get more students to vote. The contest originally called for students to prove they had voted in Tuesday's general election, but IUSA executives changed the guidelines for the contest after realizing it might violate federal election laws.\nTaylor, who voted in yesterday's election, said she was contacted by IUSA president Bill Gray around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday afternoon at her home near Elletsville.\n"I was working on a paper for my E104 class when I got the call," she said. \nWhen asked whether she finished the paper, her reply: "Hell no!"\nShe said she and her friend took some time after receiving the news to "go crazy."\nTaylor describes herself as a "non-traditional" student because she works and goes to school part-time. She is married and has an eight-year-old child and plans to finish her associates degree in the spring.\nTaylor's husband, Philip, apparently didn't believe his wife when she called him with the news. \n"He didn't believe me. I was talking on the phone with my insurance agent," Michella Taylor said. "I let him tell my husband." \nTaylor said she was taken to a "secure location" on campus, which she later identified as a fraternity house, where the car was located. It was there that she was given keys to the automobile and drove it home.\nPhilip Taylor said he wasn't aware of the contest, but said he thinks the car went to the right person.\n"I'm sure she knows all about (the contest)," Taylor said. "She works and goes to school, so she's pretty busy. I think her winning this car was well deserved."\nAlong with the corvette contest, two $5,000 scholarships were awarded to two IU students. Sophomore Kelly Sparks was one of those students.\nSparks, a nutrition science major, said she was surprised to win because she hadn't entered any contest.\n"I was actually just home in between classes for lunch, and when Bill Gray called me, I thought it was a joke," Sparks said. \nShe said this scholarship will help her because she is planning to study abroad next semester through a non-IU program. \n"Hopefully it will carry over when I come back," she said.\nThe other scholarship recipient chose not to be named, but is said to be a male international graduate student.\nGray said the names were drawn through a random computer-generated process under the supervision of Dean of Students Richard McKaig and Assistant Dean of Students Jim Gibson.\nGray also said that Taylor would assume full responsibility for the car's expenses.\nTaylor said she didn't know whether she would keep the car.