Special to the Record
This week all 1600 students in Chelsea High School received a free copy of the Students Pocket Guide for Civic Engagement: Chelsea Edition due to the leadership of Superintendent Dr. Almudena Abeyta. The Pocket Guide addresses the requirement that high school students in Massachusetts complete a Civics Action Project in order to graduate.
The Legislature passed a law in 2018 to ‘Promote and Enhance Civic Engagement’ but little provision was made as to how the students and their teachers would address this mandated assignment. This Pocket Guide now gives the students in Chelsea, with other Massachusetts communities soon to follow, a tool to outline their personal research. Its ‘Impact Page’ identifies dozens of public and private agencies within Chelsea that students can contact, often with names, phones and emails to help connect with potential mentors.
“We have future leaders in Chelsea High, students with tremendous potential to play significant roles in our city and even our country if given the resources and motivation,” said Dr. Abeyta. Long recognized for innovative educational leadership, and recipient of several national awards, the Superintendent continues, “when I learned a guide was being created to show teenagers how to contact potential civic action partners in local government, and even how contact elected officials in the State House and in Washington, DC, I wanted Chelsea and my students to be first in line.”
According to Publisher Andrea Laufer, former Marketing Director of the State House News Service, “Right now when many young people are losing faith in our country, becoming less inclined to even vote, and being manipulated by online algorithms, we wanted them to know America still remains the ‘Land of Opportunity.’ And that opportunity includes them. They are American citizens with rights and privileges nobody can take away but they also have personal responsibilities, notably to vote and be involved with their community.”
“To that end,” Laufer continues, “we show them how to write letters to the editor, how to file a Freedom of Information request, and how to spot fake news. We don’t merely show them how to register to vote but outline how they themselves can run for the city council in their own communities in Massachusetts. We include a hands-on guide for creating a winning campaign written by one of the most successful campaigners in modern Massachusetts, former State Senator Marian Walsh.”
The Pocket Guide is unprecedented in the array of information provided. In addition to the Declaration of Independence and US Constitution in several relevant languages, some via QR Code, there are chapters on media literacy, how to separate ‘spin’ from fact, how to apply for a student internship and how to introduce legislation in the Massachusetts State House.
The Chelsea edition is sponsored by Josh Resnek, former Chelsea Record Editor and Chelsea Record photographer Arnold Jarmak. Resnek believes “an understanding of how government works for Chelsea High School students is absolutely imperative for them to be able to exercise their rights. This civics pamphlet is exactly the tool which will allow them to maneuver Chelsea City Hall and the broader state government.”
Jarmak expands upon Resnek’s comments noting, “For young people in Chelsea trying to find their way, this civics pamphlet adds a valuable tool to their efforts. Knowing how to approach government in order to change it for the better is serious business. For Chelsea High students, the civics pamphlet provides a road map to reach out to their government. Most significant,” Jarmak concludes, ‘they need to be heard,”