Selawik School should restore student government

JACKOLYN McCOY

February 15, 2008 at 8:25PM AKST

For The Arctic Sounder

Any school’s student council is an avenue for students and teachers to incorporate ideas into meeting school and community needs.

Mainly, students can share their ideas and concerns to make changes in their school.

Student council members are taken more seriously as leaders.

As a whole, students and teachers can accomplish more to make a better school through student council.

The Student Council in Selawik is not functioning this year but needs to be reinstated for many reasons:

Student government offers students the chance to express their ideas and concerns for their school and it plays an important role in building leadership in young adults. Also, students not involved in many other school activities can contribute positively through student council.

Young people build self-esteem, personal confidence and social cooperation through a council.

Selawik needs a student council because it promotes positive encouragement to everyone involved.

Student behavior improves when teachers and students share discipline responsibilities because students and teachers can develop rules and enforce school rules in partnership. The student council is a perfect forum for this.

When Selawik School had a functioning student council, it addressed the problem of students who were vandalizing by writing on school facilities.

The council resolved this nuisance by hanging a huge piece of paper on the school lobby’s wall. Students then wrote on the paper, instead of on the walls.

Students themselves came up with this solution for their peers to stop defacing school walls.

Student councils prepare young adults with leadership experience for when they enter adulthood. Leadership should start developing in high school or even sooner, with real opportunities to undertake such roles at school.

According to the Website of the Mills Lawn School in Yellow Springs, Ohio, the "student council plays a very important role in every school" to help students become responsible, active community leaders and active, responsible adults.

The National Association of Student Councils says that students involved in co-curricular activities during high school increase the chance of completing all their graduation requirements because such participation improves school attendance.

Through student council, members often develop mindsets to achieve their ambitions.

The National Association of Student Councils also says that group membership in a student council promotes self-esteem, self-confidence, team-building, and social-cooperation skills.

A significant number of Selawik students are not interested in the school’s limited offering of sports, which are the main activities offered in this isolated community in Northwest Arctic Alaska.

A re-established student council would offer those students opportunities to be involved in organizing and running school events as they approach adulthood.

A student council promotes a wide variety of student talents.

Youths with more mental and leadership qualities than athletic abilities should still have opportunities to contribute to the school and community.

Student council projects help the next generation build an upbeat community.

It can help set up community activities and fundraisers. For example, if a family who has lost a loved one needs financial assistance or a fire has left a family homeless, the student council can help organize local fundraisers.

This shows that the young want to help build a positive community. A student council does more for an individual on the team: it gives students experience to build their citizenship.

Selawik needs a student council.

Jackolyn McCoy, a high school senior in Selawik, wrote this piece in an honors English class distance delivered to students in the Northwest Arctic Borough School District by Chukchi College, a Kotzebue-based University of Alaska branch campus.

"Jack" plans to attend college full-time next fall. This piece is distributed by Chukchi News and Information Service, winner of a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award.