Mock Student Council Campaign/Election
Project Description
By the end of this project, students will have learned the following:
--Develop and plan a persuasive speech.
--Identify and analyze Aristotelian ethical, logical and emotional appeals in a speech.
--Analyze causes and effects of corruption in local and global governments.
--Understand how language and public speaking influences the public.
--Internalize and sympathize with discriminatory practices based on class or gender.
--Reflect upon the roles of citizens as voters and protectors of society.
Purpose: To provide a real-life task in which students can practice the above objectives and place them within a
relevant context. In Julius Caesar, politics was about more than making laws. It was also about writing, speaking and
presenting information persuasively in order to convince and affect the audience—skills that we still use today in
political campaigns. It was also about the need for knowledgeable participation in the civic process by informed and
skilled voters. Now it’s your job to model these methods in the democracy of ISP’s student council.
In this project, students will create a mock campaign for a student council candidate in the classroom, write campaign
speeches, either perform or view performed the campaign speeches, and vote on the most appropriate candidate.
Step 1: Choose a role. Each student will select a particular position for which they will campaign. There may be no more
than 3 people running for a particular position. Depending on the number of students, we will have a number of
positions available that students can choose from, including but not limited to the following: president, vice-president,
treasurer, secretary, student activities coordinator, advisor to the dean, community service coordinator, etc.
Step 2: Learn how to appeal to an audience. Consider the difference between using ethical, logical and emotional
appeals in order to capture the attention and support of an audience. Pinpoint how these types of appeals can be used
in writing and presenting a speech by participating in in-class activities. (Look to Julius Caesar as an example!)
Step 3: Know your audience. What qualities does your audience value? How can student council candidates guard
against discrimination/intolerance of students? How can you embody their values as a student council candidate? We
will do an in-class survey of the 10th grade to find out what they want from a candidate and then graph the results. We
will put this information on a Powerpoint for all candidates to use.
Step 4: Know your role as a voter. Using the class video cameras or your own Blackberries, contribute to a Movie Maker
video in which ISP students, staff and teachers from many different areas of the school discuss the importance of the
voter to the democratic process. We will do this during class time, and the video will be shown on Election Day for
inspiration. We will also do some reflective in-class activities.
Step 5: Write your campaign speech. Use your knowledge of audience, purpose and appeals to compose a speech.
Assess yourself, and then submit the speech for peer review on Canvas. Finally, submit your corrected speech for an
online teacher conference via Canvas and correct until you are ready for final copy and performance. See Attached
Rubric and models also on Edline!***
Step 6: Practice and perform your speech. Learn how to use eye contact, volume control, gestures, facial expressions,
and dramatic pauses to your advantage. Practice these skills and then perform your speech to the 10th grade class and a
“surprise” audience member/s on Election Day. There may be more than one Election Day in order to accommodate the
volume of students. See Attached Rubric also on Edline!***
Step 7: Vote for the best candidate, not just for yourself. Consider the effectiveness of the speeches and the platforms
of the candidates. Vote for the candidate. Afterward, analyze the speeches for ethical, logical and emotional appeals and
vote accordingly by filling out a worksheet and participating in discussion. The “surprise” audience member/s will also
give feedback on the presentation. Let’s see how the analysis afterward compares to the voting results!
Step 8: Who is stealing your votes? Consider how corruption would affect the democratic process. During the unit, we
will take a look at news articles discussing both local and global issues of governmental corruption. Problem-solve on
how to prevent corruption in the election process through discussion and other classroom activities. How do we protect
the ethical values of our countries?