Little Red School House
and Elisabeth Irwin High School

A Pre-K-12 Progressive Education

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Modeling our Best Selves

Congratulations to the cast and crew of the Middle School musical the Wizard of Oz. Thanks also to director Joanne Magee, musical director Susan Glass for so ably leading the students on this journey. Congratulations also to Matt McLean and Susan Glass again for preparing students and directing them in this week's most excellent Spring Concert. Both of these events allowed us to see middle school students working at being their best selves. Click on the image to view more pictures from these events.

Building on the idea of our middle schoolers going out into the world and being their best selves, this weekend our Model Congress team participated in the 24th Packer Collegiate Middle School Model Congress. This year’s participants included sixth graders Louie and River; seventh graders Daniel, Ella, Rose, Renzo and Troy; and eighth graders Camilo, Chloe, Chiara, Julia, Lauren, Liv, Semiramis, Sophia C. and Sophia R. High school students and former middle school Model Congress members Lola and Ray served as Parliamentarians who helped to coordinate the event. The group has worked with faculty facilitator Sharyn Hahn since the end of October to write bills, prepare speeches, read students’ bills from the other participating schools, and learn about and practice parliamentary procedure. The team spent the entire day this past Saturday at Packer Collegiate High School for the annual culminating Model Congress event.

Team Picture

Nearly 200 middle school students from 13 area independent schools, including LREI, sent delegations of legislators to the event. When students arrived at the event, they broke off into one of 17 separate committees based upon the content of their bills. These committees are modeled after actual congressional committees and include among others Judiciary, Education, Health, Housing & Urban Affairs, and Science Space & Technology. After a morning committee session that was filled with heated debate and criticism, the bills that passed through their committees were reviewed in one of four full sessions. (House I, House II, Senate I and Senate II). As facilitator Sharyn Hahn reports:

The 17 LREI delegates, one of our biggest groups to date, drafted bills on a range of controversial topics the titles of which appear below. 
  • An Act to Extend Daily School Hours to Facilitate the Reduction of Homework.
  • An Act to Provide Optional Free/Subsidized Tracking Devices for Children with Communication Disabilities.
  • An Act to Make Inappropriate Advertising and Pop-up Ads on the Internet.
  • An Act to Mandate Public Government Buildings to Have a Mixed Gender Bathroom.
  • An Act for the Government Regulation of Sports Betting.
  • An Act to Legalize Euthanasia in the United States. 
  • An Act to Allow Transgender Students to Choose Which Gender Specific Sports Teams, Locker Rooms, and Bathrooms They Would Prefer to Identify With and Have Access To.
  • An Act to Revise the Laws Regarding Youth Incarceration in The United States of America.
We had a very successful day at the Packer Collegiate Model Congress, which was the result of the significant time and energy that went into all of the well-prepared, confident, and interesting presentations. I was extremely proud of our delegates. Our bills were represented in eight different morning session committees with each committee comprised of up to 20 delegates from all of the participating schools from the tri-state area. Seven of our eight bills were passed in these morning House and Senate sub-committees after debates and caucusing took place. At the end of the morning session, the delegates from all of the schools in each committee voted for the most interesting and controversial bill to move on to the Plenary, or full, session. Two of our bills were voted to move to the Plenary session. This was very exciting and our delegates were thrilled and supportive of each other. After lunch, the committees merged into larger groups, and the winning bills were debated again amongst new peers, as well as members of previous committees. After an hour and a half of debate, both of our bills, debated in different committees, were passed, which was very exciting for all of the LREI delegates. Eighth grader Lauren defended her bill about mixed gender bathrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams, and seventh graders Ella and Renzo presented their bill about the regulation of sports betting. At the Awards Ceremony, seventh grader Rose and eighth graders Camilo and Julia received Honorable Mentions for their debating skills and comportment; eighth grader Chiara was awarded a coveted Golden Gavel. This award is given to one member of each morning committee in recognition of her/his excellent debating skills, knowledge about the other legislation in the committee, and professionalism. The winners were chosen by the Chairperson and Parliamentarian of the respective House/Senate meetings. 
 
Congratulations to all of the members of the Model Congress team! 

In the spirit of celebrating our best work, all middle schoolers were given a copy of our literary magazine IE, which features writing and artwork from students in grades seven though twelve. It is an excellent read.

Finally, a reminder that tomorrow is Field Day. Students should come in their class colors and with a bagged lunch (no nuts, seeds or glass bottles).
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Little Red School House
and Elisabeth Irwin High School

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