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Students at Hayden-Winkelman Schools cast their votes. (Mila Lira photo)
By Mila Lira
The staff at Hayden-Winkelman Unified School district went above and beyond to bring the political system and election cycle to life for students of the district earlier this month. With the upcoming Presidential election in the news on a daily basis, this activity brought the process to the students level and most importantly taught them about the importance of voting in elections at all levels.
The week started off with some friendly campaigning by Jeff Gregorich for the Cheetah Party and Paul Hatch of the Turtle Party. Gregorich is the Superintendent of the district and Hatch is the Principal of the elementary school. During the week the students had the opportunity to learn what each candidate stood for and on Thursday the students all met in the gymnasium for a Presidential Debate. The debate was moderated by Mila Lira of the Copper Basin News and Bill Loehr from Asarco was the Master of Ceremonies for the event.
The questions for the debate were all provided by students in the district following the lessons they had been learning about government and politics during the week. The questions covered many of the topics that voters will look at in the fall such as the economy, taxes, education, war, foreign policy and space exploration to name a few. The candidates both did an excellent job at answering the questions that aligned with the focus of their newly formed political party. Through their answers they also brought out some of the basic ideals of both the conservative and liberal party lines and discussed the various forms of government. The debate had an interesting twist at the very end when Gregorich called for an investigation of the Turtle Party super PAC because there was evidence that the PAC violated clean election laws because delicious turtle candies has been given to these junior voters.
Each of the students in grades K-12 participated in the events of the week as well as the debates. While the Junior High and High School students were a little more reserved on their emotion during the debate the Kindergarteners through sixth graders made signs, and were all chanting for their party or animal of choice.
Following the debates the students each had the opportunity to cast their vote for the candidate of their choice.
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