Meeting requirements (02/06/07)

Jay County High School students are stepping out of the classroom and into the council room.

Students participating in the public meeting project will get a first hand look at democracy as they attend two public meetings.

"It's one thing sitting down, seeing it in a text book and being told how government works, but it's another thing going to a meeting and seeing it in action... The project is a good thing. It should be done nationally," JCHS senior Steven Minnich said before the start of a recent Portland Planning Commission meeting.

"Young people are not getting involved in government. This introduces them to government and how to be more involved. It's an incentive... You learn quite a bit." Minnich added.

Each nine week grading cycle, juniors or seniors taking current problems and U.S. government have seven weeks to attend two meetings and write a required paper. Teachers provide students with a list of meetings they are allowed to attend. The list, which contains 24 boards and councils, includes numerous town, city and county boards as well as library boards, Jay County Hospital Board and Jay School Board.

To complete the assignment, students submit a one to two page paper that answers four questions about the meetings they attended. Students compare and contrast the meetings, explain their impression and opinion of the political system and explain how the experience of attending the meetings will change their behavior.

According to the project outline, this assignment is meant to give students an opportunity to participate in government and the democratic process, to observe community participation and be aware of ways to become involved in the community.

"Kids need to understand what democracy is. I am very big on civic responsibility and I think the two go together... Kids need to understand that democracy is participatory," said Jane Switzer, a retired Jay County High School teacher. Switzer along with her husband Steve Ford, also a retired JCHS teacher, were co-founders of the public meeting visitation project. "A quote that I've always used 'it's the rent you pay for the space you take.' We have an obligation to our community, whether it's our school community, local community, your state or the world. I wanted the kids to start at the local level so they could be part of what was going on and take part in what was going on. No matter where they went afterwards they could take that experience with them."

Switzer and Ford passed the torch following their retirement in 2005 onto U.S government and current problem teachers Paul Szymczak, Ben Dues and Tim Millspaugh.

"It makes it a living experience. It takes what we teach in government and current problems from being something abstract and out of the textbook and puts them on the front lines, experiencing what they are learning about," Szymczak said.

Millspaugh added that the project removes many misconceptions students have about local government.

"(The students) have ideas as to how they believe this process works and a lot of times it is completely opposite of how it really happens," Millspaugh said.

"Almost every time (in their final papers) they talk about how they want to get more involved and they didn't know how this happens."

Dues also requires his students to include five government vocabulary words in their papers.

"Just the idea of getting kids to understand the concept of government and apathy. Sometimes people just don't care. It pushes them into the arena. They are involved just by being there," said Dues, adding that as a graduate at JCHS, he completed the public meeting project during his senior year.

Students can also attend a third meeting for extra credit.

JCHS senior Jessica Pitman was attending her third meeting at the Portland Planning Commission. Her attendance will add 10 points of extra credit to the possible 100 point project score.

She also attended a Portland City Council meeting and Redkey Town Board meeting.

"I learned what they do in the community. I didn't know that there were street and park departments," Pitman said adding that at the Redkey Town Board meeting she heard reports from all of the town department heads as well as the police and fire department chiefs.

"(This project) gets people involved in the community and gives them a chance to see what it's all about."

Approximately 100 to 120 students from four to five classes attend meetings every nine weeks. Every senior at JCHS will complete the public meeting project during their U.S. government class, which is required to graduate.

JCHS senior Ashley Rockwood completed this project last year as a junior in her current problems class and was attending the planning commission meeting as her first meeting for her government class.

Last year she attended the Portland Library Board and a town board meeting in which there was discussion of a street renovation project.

"(The library board) has a lot of money going in and out of there. I would have never imagined," Rockwood said. "It also takes a lot of money redoing a road.

The teachers encourage students to come to class wanting to talk about what they experienced at the meetings they attended.

"They bring up issues from meetings. Everyday I open (class) asking if anyone went to a meeting the previous night," Dues said. "It's almost like they are in the process of writing their paper in their head. I get some really good discussions from some of those meetings."

Meetings that included controversial issues such as the recent construction of the ethanol plant drew a lot of next-day discussion.

"There were a lot of people interested and we took a look at both perspectives," Millspaugh said. "One of the things that I try to do it leave it for them to decide. I don't care as much about what they think as much as why they think what they think... You show controversy and kids are interested in that."

By grading the students' completed paper, teachers can tell if a student understood the assignment and got something out of it.

"One of the things that amazes me is when kids start to understand what all has to be done by government agencies. Somebody has to do all of this stuff; things just don't happen. Every single thing has to go through these committees and boards and the whole process. They realize how big it really is how it impacts everything that goes one," Szymczak said.

"(Sometimes) it's like an epiphany. The light comes on," Dues said. "They wouldn't have gotten that by just reading a book."[[In-content Ad]]