Senate simulation stimulates students

November 27, 2011 — by Ashley Tang

Senior Sean Ruiz stood up in his first period U.S. government class and began reading out loud from his physics textbook. Stunned, the class watched in silence and then broke into confusion until they realized that Ruiz was attempting a filibuster, a way to stall a bill from being passed in the Senate.

Senior Sean Ruiz stood up in his first period U.S. government class and began reading out loud from his physics textbook. Stunned, the class watched in silence and then broke into confusion until they realized that Ruiz was attempting a filibuster, a way to stall a bill from being passed in the Senate.

During the week of Nov. 7, around 115 seniors in U.S. government classes taught by history teachers Kirk Abe and Jerry Sheehy stepped into the roles of senators and tried to pass several bills based on current issues.

Abe has been carrying out this simulation for 10 years, but each year he tries to improve it to better portray the Senate.

“It was much different this year than it was 10 years ago,” Abe said. “Before, students were not allowed to filibuster and it was not as complex. In the future, I plan to incorporate the press and some other aspects to make [the simulation] as realistic as possible.”

Students believe that they were able to learn much more by participating in such a simulation.

“It was helpful because a lot of people didn’t realize how important and time-consuming it is to make these laws,” senior Darisha Jhutty said. “The process was long and tenuous at times, but also very educational.”

The class was divided into Republicans and Democrats based on an opinion survey at the beginning of the year, and each party decided on their party platform of bills they wanted to pass and bills they wanted to block. Senior Victor Sutardja, a Republican in the simulation, was proud of his party’s success.

“We won,” Sutardja said. “We were able to pass the bill to send troops to Uganda and didn’t pass any of the other bills that we were against.”

However, Sutardja also realized that the extremely strong competition between the two parties may have a negative impact on Congress.

“The simulation showed me how dangerous partisanship is, because nothing gets done,” Sutardja said.

The class also voted to elect students as president, majority leader, minority leader and heads of various bill-writing or senatorial committees such as the committee writing the Dream Act or the actual Committee of Foreign Relations.

Students with these jobs had specific roles to fill to realistically portray these positions in U.S. government. Majority and minority leaders organized and lead their party members during the party caucuses. After, the president gave a speech to inform the senators what he wanted in each bill in order for him to sign the bill into law instead of vetoing it. For students with these positions, it was easier to contribute to discussions.

“It wasn’t exactly fair because there were only a few positions, so a small number of people did most of the talking,” senior Amanda Olson said. “Not everyone participated.”

Despite this shortcoming, Abe believed it was easier for many students to learn the material this way.

“Today in class, I heard some students use the word ‘caucus.’ I don’t think they ever would have used that word if they just saw it in a textbook,” Abe said. “There’s no better way of learning things than actually doing them.”

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