Agua Caliente Student Council 2015-16 Liaison Teachers: Mr. Leon and Ms. Santana

Student Council What is the Student Council? The Student Council is a group of students who come up with ideas to make our school better. Students elect Council Members and Class Representatives. Students participate in school activities, make decisions, and get to see democracy in action.

Who is on the Council? One Representative from each 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classroom (and alternate). TK-5th grade vote for school President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasure (Council Members). All Council Members must be 5th graders.

What does the Council do? After discussing ideas with the classrooms they represent, the council will do the following: Choose goals Create publicity about: School events/activities Promote school pride Start fundraising programs

What do Council Members do? President: Runs meetings, represents council, leading pledge, greeting guests, and break ties Vice President: Fills in for President and attends meetings Secretary: Takes minutes, reports at each meeting and on previous meetings, and keeps attendance Treasurer: Works closely with Mrs. Milward on written records, money earned and spent

What do Representatives do? Attend meetings Bring ideas/suggestions from classrooms Report information back to their class and designated k-2 classrooms Help with SC projects

Classroom Rep. 3rd, 4th, or 5th grade (one per classroom) Write a letter or speech about why you want to represent your classroom. Teachers discretion on who may run Election held in class on Friday, October 2nd.

Council Member Elections 5th grade students only On Friday, September 18th classroom elections for the nomination of President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasurer. Only one nominee for each office per classroom Nominees must (over the weekend and Monday) Create a poster (normal sized) Write a 30 second speech about why they should be elected Bring permission slip signed by teacher and parent All results and documents due to Mr. Leon by Tuesday, September 22nd end of school If all documents are not turned in by the deadline that student will no longer be eligible to run.

Assembly and Schoolwide Election On Monday, September 28th an assembly will be held to allow nominees to give their speeches On Friday, October 9th the schoolwide election will be held. All students TK-5 can vote. There will be a voting booth set up under the shade structure

Schedule Election Schedule - Friday, September 18th Fifth Grade Nominations Classes nominate one person for each of the following positions: President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasurer. Those nominees get a Permission Form to take home. Tuesday, September 22nd Fifth Grade Speeches, Posters, and Permission Forms Due Candidates for President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Secretary must turn in their speeches, posters, and permission forms with parent and teacher signature to Mr. Leon, Room 14, by 2:15. No late submissions will be accepted. Speeches will be screened, and then returned later in the week. Monday, September 28th Fifth Grade Speeches Fifth Grade candidates for President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Secretary will have no more than 30 seconds to deliver their speech at the Monday Morning assembly (time not yet determined). Friday, October 2nd Representative Elections (in class) Friday, October 9th Election

Teacher Concerns How much time will this take? School Website Don't worry. You can make this as small or as big a part of your curriculum as you wish. For the classroom elections, if you want to develop it into some sort of project that might even cross over into Social Studies, great. This whole process has a ton of potential for extension activities. But if that's not for you, you can easily have the kids nominate and elect a student for the Council in less than five minutes. When your Representative returns to the classroom to report on the Council Meeting, you can decide to have your students take notes, ask questions, etc. Or, you can give the Representative two minutes to sum up what happened. And again, this is only once a month anyway. The elected members will be absent from your classroom for an hour each month for the meeting, and possibly more for other activities. They will also need to report back to a Kindergarten, 1st, or 2nd grade class. If you have students running for office that will not be able to keep up with classwork and make up what they missed, you might decide this is not right for them. However, we will try to limit any activities besides the monthly meeting and reporting session to recess, lunch, and before/after school. School Website This and other information can be found on the school website under Student Council.