Head O’ Meadow Students Vote

In Their Own Referendum

By Eliza Hallabeck

The day before registered voters cast their votes on the 2010-2011 budget referendum, a different kind of vote took place in the cafeteria of Head O’ Meadow school.

Overseen by school PTA volunteers, the third annual Head O’ Meadow Referendum asked students to vote to determine which category of books they would like purchased for the school’s library.

“The hope is that the [Head O’ Meadow] Referendum will provide our children the opportunity to learn about the referendum process, including the importance of voting and having their voices be heard,” wrote school PTA members Joan Plouffe and Sharon Saunders in a letter to all school teachers before the event.

With students lining up to vote behind her on the school cafetorium’s stage, Ms Plouffe said email notifications were also sent home to parents encouraging dialogue on voting between parents and their children.

The event is important because it promotes reading books in the school library and teaches the students a civics lesson, Ms Plouffe said.

Democratic Registrar of Voters LeReine Frampton agreed, saying having the students vote for their preferred books will give each student a greater invested interest in the books in the school’s library.

Ms Frampton brought a voting machine to the school for the day, and created the ballots with the help of her daughter, Sara Frampton, at home.

“If they get used to voting when they are young, get excited about it when they are young, it gets them used to the voting process for when they are adults,” Ms Frampton said.

According to the letter sent from Ms Plouffe and Ms Saunders, students could vote for one of two category choices.

Ms Frampton used her home computer to print the ballots, and said the event was at no cost to the school. For the first time since the voter outreach program has been happening at the school, color was added the ballots, giving students the choice to vote for a Red or Blue option.

Books in the Blue option included topics of animals, myths, and celebrations.

Books in the Red option included topics of pets, science, and the arts.

Student Madeline Patrick said she was voting for the Blue choice, consisting of animals, myths, and celebrations. She said she liked that choice because it included books about mermaids and monsters.

First graders Brandon Manka and Daniel Delia said they would both be voting for the Red choice, for books in the pets, science and arts category.

Brandon said he likes reading books about art, while Daniel said he would like to read books about dogs.

“When you pick something,” Ms Frampton said, “I think it makes a difference.”

Every student in the school voted during the Monday referendum for his or her choice of book categories to be added to the school’s library.

The results were counted by 1:30 pm, and were announced Tuesday, April 27, during morning announcements at the school.

According to Ms Plouffe, a total of 360 ballots were cast, and the winning collection of books was the Red collection — pets, science and arts — with 206 votes. The Blue collection had 153 votes, and one voter at the school was undecided.