U.S. Embassy School Election Concludes with a national poll:

On November 5, 120 teachers and students from Berlin, Brandenburg, and Saxony-Anhalt gathered at the Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation in Berlin as delegates of their “adopted” state and cast their vote http://us-election.explorarium.de/pluginfile.php/30228/mod_resource/content/1/predictions_school_project.png

Including absentee ballots from participating schools especially from the Hamburg district, Lüneburg and Duesseldorf, the students predicted that President Obama will win a second term. These predictions were based on intensive classroom work and materials especially developed on an e-learning platform by project partners LISUM Berlin-Brandenburg, Leuphana Universität Lüneburg and explorarium Life e.v. 1700 students and teachers from 10 German states participated in the project. Ambassador Murphy gave awards to classes with the best submissions to the project among them videos, posters, cartoons, and even a song. View these creative student contributions:  http://us-election.explorarium.de/

• Rundfunk Berlin Brandenburg TV report
• Der Tagesspiegel
• U.S. Embassy Berlin Facebook photo gallery

U.S. Embassy Election 2012 School Project

In cooperation with

LISUM Berlin-Brandenburg, Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, and "eXplorarium"
LIFE e.V.

Background

In 2008, the U.S. Embassy together with LISUM Berlin-Brandenburg organized a very successful school project on the U.S. Presidential Election with about 100 schools. The U.S. Embassy invited American experts to brief teachers on election processes, issues, candidates and campaigns. Individual classes worked intensively in a two-week period on an individual state, explored its economic, cultural and political framework, inquired about past voting behavior in that respective state and based on their intensive studies predicted how their state would vote in the Presidential Election 2008. On election morning, representatives of all participating schools cast their vote in a concluding event at the Rotes Rathaus Berlin. The students’ predictions on the results of the Presidential Election 2008 turned out to be closer than most professional polls!

U.S. Embassy School Election Project 2012

Together with their partners, the U.S. Embassy is conducting another school election project in the election year 2012. The format will be similar, but we have added a social media component via an e-learning platform.  Discussions will take place in the classroom in a traditional way, but they also include discussions among participating schools via Moodle and live web chats with experts.  

While the core group is in Berlin and Brandenburg, we have invited interested teachers and schools throughout Germany to engage in discussions with us, the U.S. Consulates and the German American Institutes. Pl. look out for lectures, teacher seminars and other offers on their websites as well.  Contact person at the U.S. Consulates are: Jochen Bast, Hamburg (BastJ@state.gov); Dr. Gerhard Wiesinger, Frankfurt (WiesingerGO@state.gov); Jutta Tatzelt, Düsseldorf (TatzeltJ@state.gov).

With or without a focus on social media: Every school can participate!

Together with LISUM, our partner "eXplorarium" LIFE e.V. have developed a Moodle platform for those participating teachers who are interested in using a learner’s platform for their classroom work. Dr. Karin Ernst has designed a model virtual classroom and provides a “manual” on how to use it.

Christine Junghanns, LISUM, Prof. Dr. Torben Schmidt and Joannis Kaliampos, Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, have developed a teaching methodology for including social media in the election project. Their students further developed materials from the 2008 election project which are part of the e-learning classroom library.

Coming up:

• Through the U.S. Embassy and U.S. Consulate MeetUS program, Americans are prepared to visit schools and discuss election issues. For Berlin and Brandenburg, pl. contact Heike Mead at the U.S. Embassy who is in charge of that program:  MeadHS@state.gov or go to the Embassy website for more information: www.usembassy.de/.
• Participating schools will work on “their state” in September/October as part of their curriculum.
• Results of the school projects will be posted on our website.
• In Berlin and Brandenburg, teacher and student representatives of the participating schools will be invited to a concluding event the day before election day (November 5) to discuss their results with an American expert.
• Students engage in web chats, blogs, and online discussions with experts during the actual school project.
• Final Project Discussion with representatives of participating schools and expert William Chandler, Professor of Political Science, University of California, San Diego, will take place on November 5, 2012 at the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung in berlin for Berlin-Brandenburg school representatives. 

Our partners: