THE ELECTION PROJECT
wHAT WAS THIS PROJECT ALL ABOUT?
The point of this project is to not only learn about how the process of the
the presidential works, but to be able to inform other people over the different
candidates and current issues. The essential question when we first started our project was "what does it mean to be an educated voter?"
the presidential works, but to be able to inform other people over the different
candidates and current issues. The essential question when we first started our project was "what does it mean to be an educated voter?"
Project Objectives.
- Get up close and personal with the game of Politics: Defense & Offense
- Learning about the presidential candidates and their platform
- Develop a deeper understanding of the American’s Election & Voting system.
- Knowing the importance of fact-checking
- Use political propaganda to achieve your goal of getting your candidate to win our campus election
- Analyzing the role of media in today’s politics
- Learn how to debate and use political rhetoric
- How to work as a functioning campaign team
- Educate others on the issues and get them to vote
Inspiration.
Some inspiration in the beginning of the project came from the https://www.isidewith.com/ survey in which I sided the most with Jill Stein representing the green party. |
Before the election part of the project we had chances to talk about what it means to be patriotic and how that is a different definition for everyone. As well as having lessons on how to become and educated voter and a lot of really fun and exiting practice debates within our classes.
The Process
Dear Future president letter
For this part of the project we wrote one 500 word letter to the future president of the United States of America. The final rubric for this assignment was made by what we as a class thought a quality letter to the president should have.
here is the rubric;
here is the rubric;
- Address an Issue
- How President can "Resolve" or "Approach' Issue
- less than 500 words
- Personal touch/connection
- Argument for change(convincing)
- genuine, Passionate, Creative, Unique writing style, Interesting font, professional
- Good Grammar
- Evidence and Factual
The first step to the letter was the commentary analysis, in this portion of the project we looked up facts and statistics to back our claims up. If you don't have solid evidence nobody will take your claim seriously
The second step was the outline of the letter, we just outlined the skeleton of the letter as a guide to follow when we get into the writing.
The third step was the first draft, we had our outline and our facts now we just had to sit down and write without thinking of word limit.(my first draft was over double the maximum word count!)
The fourth step was to make our second draft, in this draft we thought more about the word count and making every little word count towards the thesis.
The fifth step was the third draft, we had to dramatically reduce our words and start looking at what the final version might look like.
The sixth and final step was to make the final draft, as you can see the letter font changed as well as some other little tweaks. Then we were done we had our letter to submit to PBS! (Check out all of the links down below.)
The second step was the outline of the letter, we just outlined the skeleton of the letter as a guide to follow when we get into the writing.
The third step was the first draft, we had our outline and our facts now we just had to sit down and write without thinking of word limit.(my first draft was over double the maximum word count!)
The fourth step was to make our second draft, in this draft we thought more about the word count and making every little word count towards the thesis.
The fifth step was the third draft, we had to dramatically reduce our words and start looking at what the final version might look like.
The sixth and final step was to make the final draft, as you can see the letter font changed as well as some other little tweaks. Then we were done we had our letter to submit to PBS! (Check out all of the links down below.)
The campaign team debate preparation.
Choosing roles/teams At this point in the project we drew out of a hat to decide what campaign team we were on. I ended up getting Donald J Trump as my candidate. I also joined the social issues team and I was in charge of healthcare and paid leave/child care. Research Now that we had out roles and issues planned out it was time to do some research. In one document I put the research for both of my issues. This is the heart and foundation of what is to come because it contains the facts and proof of what Donald J Trump stands for. Now that I had my research and what Trump stands for, it was time for me to fact check what he has said. We want to tell people what he stands and promises, but we also want to tell people the truth help them become educated voters. For this specific document I did not really write to much because in the last document I fact checked Trump without meaning to. After we figured out what we want to share to the public it was time to put all of this into one opening statement. In this statement I had to introduce the issue and how Trump stood on it. For example I talk about how for healthcare Trump states that Obama care has been terrible and should be repealed and replaced. |
Truth campaign add
For this part of the project we made a video that we showed at exhibition to better inform people on social issues and how true some statements made by candidates are.
Fact checking
We started by doing some more fact checking for our video. for this part I did not have to fact check much because the videos are supposed to tell people the truth over statements of the candidate and I already had all of my fact check in my quotes and analysis.
Then we went crazy on the research and fact checked a lot more. Drawing videos pictures statistics graphs. I like to call it the chocolate chips that will go into the cookies.
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Story Board
The Takeaway
Overall I think that this is one of the projects that I will never forget. I not only learned to not rely on media to base my beliefs on but I learned to really look at and research an issue and take a stance on it. Not only that but I learned to become a voter that doesn't vote for the best of two evils but to look at all of the options. For example I didn't know who Jill Stein was until I realized she shares a lot of my beliefs. The last takeaway and in my eyes the most important one is that no matter what, nobody should be scared to state their opinion and stance. I learned to not only become informed and educated in politics but to defend my beliefs with facts and to hold a conversation with someone who thinks that because I am 16 years old I am naive or uneducated.