Students discuss the role of media in government

A shorter version of this story was published in the March 5- 18, 2014 issue of Morgan Hill Life

By Staff Report

Educating young Americans about democracy and government is an important part of building solid citizens. So Morgan Hill Life Publisher Marty Cheek welcomed the invitation by Live Oak High School teacher Darcy Foster to visit her civics class Feb. 24 to discover how students feel about the American experiment in government.

Cheek started the visit by asking the students their opinions on why media sources such as newspapers, the Internet, TV and radio are important components of democracy. He then turned the class into an interactive demonstration on how media can give the students a voice through a newspaper story to share their civics class knowledge and opinions with an audience of tens of thousands of Morgan Hill Life readers.

Dylan Kral, 18, a senior who aspires to be a screenplay writer, was the first student to be interviewed. Cheek asked him why understanding civics and the American story is a vital part of a young person’s education.

“I’ve always liked history because, being a writer, it helps me have more depth for what I know and what I can put into my writing and what I can write about,” Kral said. “If I don’t know anything, then I can’t write anything. But if I know a lot, I have more to write about.”

Kral shared why he plans to register and vote for the June 3  election, the first time he will go into a polling booth.

“I want to be part of what happens here and I want to have a say in what happens,” he said. “I have a voice and I want to show I have a voice.”

Senior Vivian Tan, 18, told Cheek she appreciates the process of representative government that the Founding Fathers set up for the United States.

“I like learning about the Constitution and the amendments,” she said. “It’s the way that the government works in this country, the laws that the government has to go by.”

The first amendment right to freedom of the press is important to make sure the news media can serve as a watchdog on possible abuses by government officials, she said. “It allows the papers and the news to speak about the government and not have the influence of the government,” she said. “It lets people say what they want instead of what the government wants.”

Tan plans to vote in the upcoming election and imagined what it might be like. “I might be a little nervous because it’s my first voting for an actual government,” she said.

Senior Collin Picho, 18, told Cheek he was enthusiastic about learning how the Constitution set up the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government to watch-guard each other.

“I love learning about the balance of power, how one of the branches of government checks and balances each other so not one position can have all the control,” he said. “Congress has the power to declare war and enforce martial law. So if Congress had more power than the other branches, they could potentially go to war with whoever they want without going through the process. They would pretty much be a dictatorship.”

Foster’s civics class has two foreign-exchange students. One of them is Katja Hoppu, 18, from Finland. Seeing America from a high school student perspective has helped her understand the complexities of the United States system of government. The nation is in many ways like 50 different countries united under the single banner of the United States, she said.

“Every state has their own government, but then they’re combined by the federal government,” she said

One aspect of American culture that most impressed her is the enthusiasm many of its citizens have for their country, she said. “When I came here, you can tell that a lot of the people are patriotic, like they respect their own country more,” she said. “I don’t know why that is so. For example, you can see all the flags everywhere. That’s not in Europe like that. We don’t have flags like that.”