Our goal was to get the seniors, who are eligible to vote this year, to go out and vote. But, we wanted them to understand why they were voting for a certain candidate, ignoring race and gender. We also wanted underclassmen to encourage their parents and older siblings to go out and vote. There is no excuse for not voting. In the end, if you didn't even have the decency to go out and cast your vote, you can't complain about the turn out of a certain president.

REFLECT: HIGHLIGHTS: 1. This assembly, although originally a DS project, turned into a coalition with JSA and teachers to execute it. 2. Students laughed, argued, and in general, paid attention to an assembly, which is difficult in any school because there are always people that will bring down a project someone else had worked so hard on. 3. Two assistant principals and a teacher, Mr. Bonamo, Mr. Andrews, and Mr. Mohr, were extremely proud of the Do Something club and support us on any future projects we decide to execute. CHANGES: 1. I would definitely have had the assembly at an earlier date because June is the last month of school in NY and all the teachers are busy with finals and regents; therefore, instead of filling up the auditorium to maximum we had 200 students. 2. We would enhance the mock election by adding a digital tally so that everyone could watch the election while voting to see who's winning at a certain point. PLANS AND BUDGET: Everything went as planned and in a timely manner. Regarding budget, our club tried to use school resources like our Auto CAD teacher to print out the large posters, our CIM teacher to provide us with materials to hold up the posters, ourselves to bring in fliers and decorations, and a minimum amount spent on costumes for the candidates. SUCCESS!!! The assembly was definitely successful because it caused dozens of students to shout and get rallied by the mock election, and in the end, the entire purpose was to make students care. If students are passionate enough to argue with friends over candidates and to shout when their candidate of choice wins, well then we have successfully put our point across.

The DO SOMETHING Club at Staten Island Technical High School had discussed holding an event to promote voting in the Presidential Election for about a year before we finally made the initiative. It was difficult because we had to talk to assistant principals and teachers to not only be able to use the auditorium and have the tech crew help out, but also to have classes come down and watch the actual assembly. The assembly was held on June 2nd, 2008 before Barack Obama was announced the democratic nominee; therefore, we had three students dress up as Obama, McCain, and Clinton, and discuss the three main issues for teenagers: war in Iraq, gas/ oil prices, and education. The assembly was planned and re-planned and outlined and re-outlined until every single word was accounted for time wise and until everything was rehearsed at least twice. We made sure to hand out notes to all the teachers who were able to bring down their class that period and got their signatures in advance to approximate the number of students in the audience. We created vibrant posters and outlined the auditorium into political parties. In the end, we held our own election and because of the Republican population in our area, McCain won.

By going out to vote and encouraging others to do the same!!!