On March 14th and 15th, all students that participated in a class focused on government (regular, honors, and AP government) were required to participate in an activity called Model Congress. Seniors, who are usually the only ones who take the government classes, participated in the event depending on the day they have their government class (burgundy day classes participated on March 14th and gold day classes participated on March 15th). Students did not attend their classes for that day and did not have a normal-day schedule. Instead, students spent their entire day in the auxiliary gym to collaborate with other students. Model Congress was an assignment that required the senior students write their own bills, elect leaders to represent them, and meet in committees to debate legislation. This was an activity for seniors to understand how bills are passed in the house of representatives, and apply what they have learned in class to a real-world example.

Senior Britney Jun explains that the best part of Model Congress was seeing people’s bills be debated and get to see other people’s ideas. Her bill was to go raise taxes on meat to limit meat consumption to help the environment, which is also what her capstone project is about. Many seniors chose to write their own bills about their capstone idea. This is because their capstone idea is an area of interest of theirs and focusing their bill around it makes sense as they want more focus around that idea. Britney’s favourite bill was about legalizing weed, which probably sparked a numerous amount of different opinions among students. Although Britney recommends this event for next year for the rising seniors, she suggests that Model Congress be spread over multiple days instead of just one (and two for all seniors). To take away from this activity, Britney said “I learned how bills are passed which I think is important to understand how our government works.”

Another senior, Shreya Moharir, says that she liked Model Congress particularly because she did not have to attend or do regular lectures in government class. Through this activity, she learned how tedious the process of passing a bill is. Shreya explains that this was a good way of teaching them how congress works. The bill Shreya liked was about being able to use embryonic stem cells for medical purposes.

Both seniors were able to achieve the purpose of the event as they were able to apply what they learned in class to a real-world example, and be exposed to this kind of field.