Monticello Middle School team selected to represent Kentucky at national sA Monticello Middle School team’s project has been selected to represent Kentucky at the national showcase for We the People: Project Citizen in July, when the national showcase will take place in Louisville for the first time. The team was chosen to advance after earning a rating of superior at the state Project Citizen showcase May 18 in Frankfort. The team’s project focused on addressing the problem of bullying.

Members of the Project Citizen team from Monticello Middle School are Shawna Aaron, Alia Barrier, Daniel Bertram, Emily Bertram, Matthew Bertram, Rachel Bertram, Brittany Calahan, Jeremiah Chaney, Jake Chaplin, Zoe Davis, Monica Gehring, Cheyenne Jones, McKayla Jones, Jordan Kinnett, Bethany Latham, Stephen Loveless, Zachary Massengale, Tristan McLean, Abi Perkins, Caleb Rose, Cory Sawyer, Trajan Smith, Michael Steele and Tasha Troxell.

Project Citizen is a hands-on, portfolio-based civic education program that promotes participation in local and state government by teaching students about the public policy process and encouraging civic involvement. The program helps students learn how to monitor and influence public policy. Each year, student teams in fifth through eighth grades have the opportunity to enter their Project Citizen portfolios and accompanying research binders in the state showcase. They also give a presentation on their entry and answer questions from evaluators. The evaluators select one project to represent Kentucky at the national showcase.

The Project Citizen National Showcase will take place July 25-28 during the National Conference of State Legislatures Legislative Summit in Louisville. State legislators, staff and other adult volunteers from across the nation serve as evaluators, determining the level of achievement attained by each portfolio. Teams do not give a project presentation on the national level and most are not present at the showcase.

Other teams that competed in the state showcase were from T.K. Stone Middle School in Elizabethtown, Elkhorn Middle School in Frankfort, South Laurel Middle School in London, Roosevelt-Perry Elementary School in Louisville, Eastern Elementary School in Pleasureville and Paducah Middle School in Paducah. A Project Citizen team from Henry County High School also presented its project but did not enter the showcase. The showcase is limited to fifth through eighth grades.

Project Citizen teams identify and analyze issues and problems facing their communities and address one of the issues for their project. The issue or problem must be one that could be addressed through public policy, such as a law or regulation. The groups gather information about the issue, examine policies and develop an action plan detailing the steps that need to be taken to have the appropriate school, government or other entity implement their public policy proposal. The final product is a stand-up portfolio displaying each group’s work and an accompanying binder documenting its research.

The Kentucky Court of Justice and the Center for Civic Education in California are co-sponsors of the We the People: Project Citizen program for Kentucky. Project Citizen is one of the many youth-related programs offered through the Kentucky Court of Justice and administered by the Administrative Office of the Courts in Frankfort.

The AOC is the operational arm of the Kentucky Court of Justice and supports the activities of approximately 3,400 court system employees and 403 elected justices, judges and circuit court clerks. The AOC also executes the Judicial Branch budget.


<< Return to Previous

If you copy this article to a blog or forum, please leave the identification of the source (wkym.com) in the text.