This summer Mily Daily, Cora Johnson, Kaitlyn Riggins, Jared Clair and Ian Thompson are participating in the annual American Legion Auxiliary Boys/Girls State. This is an opportunity for juniors becoming seniors to exercise their leadership skills in an event where the students run a makeshift city at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri. This weeklong event presents multiple benefits, such as an opportunity to express students’ leadership skills as well as $2 million in possible scholarships.

An interesting part about this event is that neither the student nor the student’s family can pay for the $500 admission fee; they have to get a sponsor from a club or business the student is affiliated with and if they don’t have one the coordinator will find a business that can sponsor them. This usually isn’t a bad investment because these students are picked based on if they would be successful in this event or not, so while anybody can sign up, only some will be accepted.

This event is fundamentally a mock city based in Lindenwood University where there are multiple government run jobs like being the mayor or more community jobs such as a news caster. The catch is that these positions are all filled by the students themselves, with virtually no adult help except for counselors whose sole purpose is to make sure nothing wrong happens and the students are safe. It’s purely up to the student’s discretion on whether or not they want to run for big positions or fill a smaller role, but all in all the experience is centered on exercising leadership skills. Also, at the end of the week there’s a large festival where the boys and girls can all hang out together, so there’s something to look forward to.

If you want to participate when you become a junior, contact Angela Hoefer and she’ll help you to see if you qualify, all of the kids who applied this year were accepted after all.