Blue Umbrella Official November 2016 issue | Page 2

Alph a Om ega St u den t New slet t er

Oct ober / Novem ber 2016

ELECTION
DAY 2016
Result s and Q&A wit h
Hist ory Teacher Mrs. Eben
by Rasai T.

On November 8th, 2016,
America chose their 45th
President: Republican Donald
Trump. Trump won with 279
electoral votes, beating Democrat
Hillary Clinton who received 228
electoral votes.
While the nation was deciding
who would be the next President
of the United States, students at
Alpha Omega Academy were
having their own ?election?. In a
mock election created by History
teacher Jessie Eben, students got
the chance to ?vote? for who
they?d choose for President.
Mirroring real life, Republican
Donald Trump won the mock
election. Trump received 75% of
votes among AOA students. Enjoy
a short interview with Mrs. Eben
about the mock elections:
Q: Was it your or iginal idea to
have an AOA mock election or

did you dr aw the inspir ation
from another source?
M r s. Eben: I actually did a Mock
Election for the last presidential
election as well. (Mitt Romney
won in a landslide, if you are
wondering) I was looking for ways
to help students understand the
Electoral College better because I
was hearing a lot of complaints
about why we even have it in the
US. So, I thought- what better way
to understand it than to make our
own?
Q: Do you think having mock
elections helps to encour age an
interest in politics among AOA
students?
M r s. Eben: I hope so. There has
been a huge amount of
participation, so that has been
awesome for me to see! I also
believe that the actual election has

its own draw though, with how
passionate people are one way or
the other in this particular race.
Q: What do you think is the best
par t about the AOA mock
elections (e.g. student response,
finding out the " winner " , the
gener al exper ience etc.)?
M r s. Eben: The best part, I think,
is the sense of community it
creates. I think it is awesome that
(so far) we have at least one
student from every single state in
the United States except 1 that has
responded to the survey. Think
about that! We may be all over the
nation- and all over the world- but
we can still come together as a
school to do events like this- and
learn a little about our political
process at the same time.

2 Alpha Omega St udent Newslet t er