By Michael Naughton

A fleet of school buses departed from Sen. John Kerry’s campaign headquarters on Porter Street in Boston Saturday at 9 a.m. for destinations across the state of New Hampshire for what would be a day of campaigning, calling and canvassing.

The school bus decorated in Kerry signs en route to Dover, NH contained some 20 volunteers shouting “J.K. all the way” during the 90 minute ride.

A little after 10:30 a.m., the busload of volunteers finally arrived in Dover where a row of campaign offices for former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, General Wesley Clark and Kerry lined Central Avenue.

Once at the office, volunteers went through a training process, learning how to canvass neighborhoods and call townspeople.

Canvassing is a commonly used method on many campaigns that enlists volunteers of all ages to go door to door and inform residents about a certain candidate.

After the training process, volunteers that were canvassing received a packet containing a list of homes they would visit. The volunteers were to ask potential voters if they were leaning towards voting for Kerry in the primaries.

“[Canvassing] is a lot of responsibility,” said Chris Tully, the president of the College Democrats at Northeastern and a senior political science major. “The organizers trust you to represent the campaign and to do a good job.”

Along with Tully, Heidi Buchanan, president of NU Students for Kerry, and Alexis Prieur, a member of the NU Law School Democrats, joined the group of 10 to 15 Northeastern students in canvassing. The trio started driving around Dover at 11:30 a.m. in search of 48 homes listed in their packet. The residents in these houses were categorized as being “Kerry supporters,” “leaning Kerry,” “Republican” or “other.”

Prieur said at times canvassing can be hard, but it is worth it.

“Canvassing has a bad reputation, but you really meet a lot of fun people that are really nice and receptive,” Prieur said. “You get the occasional jerk who slams the door on your face, but the war stories you have at the end of the day are fun. It’s fun grassroots politics, it is what it’s all about.”

Tully, Buchanan and Prieur shuffled in and out of their Subaru knocking on door after door, and, for the most part, they said they got the answers they were looking for.

“Today a lot of people knew who they were voting for and there was a lot of support for Kerry,” Buchanan said.

Later that day, for half an hour in a minus six degree wind chill, over 35 Kerry supporters stood at the intersection of Routes 108 and 9 in Dover , N.H. holding signs that read “John Kerry for President” and “I’m freezing for John Kerry.”

As the rush hour drivers hurried home, most took the time to honk their horns or wave their hands in support of the Kerry volunteers, who, despite the cold weather, were yelling and chanting in favor of their candidate for president.

“I will feel really good [if Kerry wins] because I would feel like I did my part getting Bush out of office,” Prieur said.

Buchanan said she is anxious to continue working for Kerry, but she has not yet made up her mind as to whether or not she will continue campaigning after the Democratic National Convention this summer.

“Depending on what happens in July, I may take a leave of absence from school to continue campaigning,” Buchanan said.