In Eden Prairie, safe, respectful and responsible voting reflects the values we teach our students every day.
Look no further to see this commitment put into practice than Eden Prairie High School’s Civics in ACTION Capstone class. Students in this Human & Public Services course learn about public policy, systems of government, and ways to meaningfully engage in civic discourse and action.
Teacher Sam Bearak encourages the 11th and 12th grade students in the elective class to take a hands-on approach to learning driven by causes they care about.
“They sign up for this class because they’re passionate about something going on, a problem, an issue in their community,” Bearak said. “It’s really student-directed in that way.”
Becoming election judges
When you cast your ballot on Election Day, you may see for yourself how these students put their passion into action. The fall semester cohort became qualified election judges over the course of two training sessions led by David Teigland, the city clerk of Eden Prairie, and will serve at polling places throughout the city on Tuesday, Nov. 5.
Nawal Abdullahi, an 11th-grade student, was surprised by how much election judges need to know and are responsible for. “I expected it to be like, ‘You’re gonna hand stuff to people, then they’ll go in and vote, and that’s that,’” she admitted. “But there was a lot more detail, and It was really interesting because they didn’t just tell us what we were gonna be doing, but why we were gonna be doing it.”
“I always thought that, you know, anything that had to do with voting was not accessible to me because I'm under 18,” she added. “But being able to be involved in such an integral part of the process is really fun.”
Visiting elected officials
Students have also had the chance to get a firsthand look at the inner workings of state and city government through visits with State Senator Steve Cwodzinski at the State Capitol and Mayor Ron Case at the Eden Prairie City Center.
“The experiences students have in this class pull back the cloak of democracy a little bit,” Bearak explained. “They get to see that these elected officials – city workers, state representatives and senators – are not meant to be inaccessible. We are meant to communicate with them, work with them, share the issues and successes in our communities with them. By having these experiences, that reality becomes clearer to students. Voting then becomes less of an abstraction, because we've met some of the people they could be voting for. We've talked to them, asked them questions, seen the work they've done, and read the bills they've signed or co-authored.”
Voter registration drive
Through their weeklong voter registration drive from Oct. 7-15, students worked to demystify the voting process for their peers, as well. In the state of Minnesota, 16 and 17-year-olds may pre-register to vote. The class seized the opportunity to get the word out about pre-registration to eligible students through tactics like classroom visits and presentations, information tables at lunch, and social media posts on the Civics in ACTION TikTok and Instagram pages.
As a member of the social media team, Abdullahi emphasized the importance of making voting information accessible and fun as a way to combat any apathy students may feel about engaging with the voting process before they are old enough to vote.
“Any 16-year-old will tell you, ‘I want to be able to make these decisions. How come all of these older people are making decisions that are going to affect us,’ you know? But getting yourself ready is just as important,” Abdullahi said. “And by doing that in a fun way making TikToks and Instagram posts, we’re able to sort of kickstart that mindset for them.” That hard work paid off: More than 50 EPHS students pre-registered to vote through the registration drive.
Capstone projects
After spending the first half of the semester-long course tackling that big group project, students will now “take what they've learned, the project management skills, the community experiences we've had, and use that as a springboard to launch their own individual project,” Bearak said.
In his two years of teaching the class, Bearak has seen students affect change with their Capstone projects in real and significant ways. One helped Hispanic immigrants study and practice questions for the driver’s license exam, another partnered with PROP Food Shelf and the National Honor Society to launch a food drive, and others worked with homeless shelters and other public service organizations.
Abdullahi has been thinking about her project since talking with her English teacher last year. She hopes to help students prepare for the ACT by raising funds for study books, prep classes, and other resources students may lack to ready themselves for the important standardized exam.
Even though she is positive she does not want to be a politician or work in the government, Abdullahi was adamant that taking Civics in ACTION, or another course like it that teaches civic responsibility, is crucial for all students.
“This is my favorite class that I’ve taken in high school,” she confirmed. “I think it’s really important for people to take a class like this and be able to understand the government, your community and what’s going to affect you.”
