Kids Voting 2002 matches up
with Sept. 11 anniversary

Mehlville school kids will start their Kids Voting 2002 election studies early this year. The kickoff events in their schools will be on Wednesday, Sept. 11.

Starting on the first anniversary of the World Trade Center disaster focuses special attention on the importance of our election process. The semester-long program ends in November when kids go to special polling places to vote on national and local candidates.

An estimated 200,000 Missouri school kids will be exposed to the Kids Voting 2002 program this fall. Over 140,000 kids in 11 St. Louis area school districts will participate.

Besides Mehlville, other area districts participating are: Clayton, Ferguson-Florissant, Fox C-6, Francis Howell, Jennings, Normandy, Parkway, Ritenour, University City and the St. Louis Public Schools.

(If you and your classmates would like to participate, ask your teacher to contact the Citizenship Education Clearing House (CHEH) at University of Missouri-St. Louis. See sidebar below for contact information.)

The national Kids Voting-USA program is held every other year. That's so kids can learn at the same time either national presidential or off-year congressional campaigns are on.

In 2000, St. Louis area kids learned all sorts of new things coming out of the controversial election of President George W. Bush.

Judy Burnette is a veteran Mehlville school teacher. She organized the district's Kids Voting 2000 plan. She's retired now but will coordinate the district's plan this year also.

Burnette said the Mehlville kids really were excited about election campaigning and voting two years ago. It was the district's first participation in the Kids Voting program.

After the balloting in November, 2000, she said, "Some kids came to school the next day crying because they didn't know who the president was." She added, "That whole Florida thing was a special lesson in itself."

Burnette said the anniversary of the Sept. 11 disaster will add to this year's Kids Voting 2002 program.

To make the connection closer, Mehlville schools decided to have their kickoff event early this year. "Usually, we don't have that opening event until late in September," she said.

One part of the Kids Voting 2002 program is establishing a "wish tree" in the elementary schools. That's a display in the schools where kids pin on written "wishes for something good for the country," Burnette said.

She said, "There'll probably be lots of wishes this year that mention Sept. 11."

Each school district decides how complete their Kids Voting 2002 lessons will be. Mehlville and Ritenour districts usually have the most complete programs. (Young Saint Louis.com wrote about Iveland Elementary School in the Ritenour district in Sept. 2000. To read about Iveland's Kids Voting 2000 program, just click here.)

The complete program for the Mehlville schools will be decided in September. It's likely to include many of the things that were done two years ago, Burnette said.

One thing that will be include is special polling places for kids in November. Those kids voting places are right next to regular polls for adult voters. While their parents vote in the real election, the kids are casting ballots nearby.

Then, the Kids Voting 2002 officials tabulate the kids votes just as if they were going to count in the real elections. (Two years ago, YSL.com published a story that compared Missouri kids' vote totals to adult totals in the same voting precincts. To check out that story from December, 2000, just click here.)

In addition, the Mehlville kids will have special election-based lessons in various classes.

Two years ago, Principal Bill Eydman of Rogers Elementary School dressed up as Uncle Sam to give his election lesson. He talked about the importance of everyone's vote. He used an example that kids could understand.

He talked about a make-believe election where 10 kids were going to decide what would be served at school lunch. The choices were: ice cream or broccoli. He said three kids voted for broccoli, two for ice cream and the other six didn't bother to vote.

Eydman said that meant everyone got broccoli although only three of 10 voted it.

In some schools, the kids pick a local issue to decide. For instance, two years ago, several schools discussed and voted on whether kids should wear uniforms to school. Whether to require uniforms is always controversial issue and encourages a lively campaign.

Burnette said, two years ago, kids in one Mehlville school wrote and performed an election song. That meant the Kids Voting lessons went into even the music classes.

 

Kids Voting 2002 is at UM-St. Louis

There's still time for St. Louis schools to get involved in Missouri's Kids Voting 2002. State headquarters for the Kids Voting-USA is at the College of Education at University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Sandy Diamond is the acting coordinator for the state program. She can be contacted by phone at (314) 516-6823. Her fax number is (314) 516-5227. She also has an e-mail address at sdiamond@umsl.edu.

Most of the school districts already signed up are in the St. Louis area. However, other Missouri districts that will participate in 2002 include those in Kansas City, Jefferson City, Fayette, Marshfield and Springfield.

After the November, 2002, off-year elections, the kids votes from all over Missouri will be tabulated and will be available on-line. (Young Saint Louis.com also plans to cover the November voting and will contrast the kids' votes with those of adult voters in the same voting precincts in the December, 2002, edition.)