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Montgomery Blair High School's Online Student Newspaper
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April 23, 2002

Multiple events conflict with SMOB election

by Jeremy Hoffman, Page Editor
The election of the Student Member of the Board (SMOB), scheduled for Tuesday the 23rd and Wednesday the 24th, faced conflicts from a College Fair, three visiting Olympic athletes, report card distribution and a teaser for the school play.

The week before, students watched a videotaped question-and-answer session of the two candidates for the Student Member of the Board of Education of Montgomery County Public Schools. Students are supposed to vote for Mihyar Alnifaidy or Alex Sellinger in the small gym during their English classes on Tuesday or Wednesday.

However, a number of events scheduled for that week could cause huge problems. English teacher Dee D'Angelo expected to have no students in her 4th period class to take to the small gym. "My kids have three conflicting events," she said.

On Tuesday, many 11th-grade students went to the Montgomery County Agricultural Field Grounds in Gaithersburg to attend the College Fair, where hundreds of college representatives set up booths to interest students in their school. Students departed on busses at 9:30 a.m. and returned around 12:30, missing periods 3, 5A, and 5B.

Also, three members of the U.S. 2002 Winter Olympics team visited at Blair from 9:00 to 10:00. All students on a fall, winter, or spring sports team will be invited to the assembly (see related story, Olympians visit Blair).

Students went to their homeroom classes tomorrow after 5B to receive their third quarter report cards. The homeroom time usually lasts about ten minutes, from 12:43 to 12:53. Five English classes were supposed to vote during that time period, but the voting process was fast enough to avoid a major backlog.

Blair’s spring play, "She Loves Me," presented teasers during 5A and 5B on Thursday, increasing the potential for schedule conflicts.

To further complicate matters, Montgomery County used the SMOB election to test a new voting system. After the ballot recounts in the 2000 presidential election, Montgomery County developed a new, fully-computerized voting system. The system uses ID cards that a voter picks up when he or she register and then swipes into an ATM-like slot in the voting booth.

According to D'Angelo, students were able to vote during their lunch on Wednesday if they missed their English class on Tuesday.

Blair’s freshmen, sophomore, and junior elections were rescheduled to the week of April 29 due to a Magnet field trip last Friday. Students will vote for class officers after watching campaign speeches in their English classes on the 29th and 30th.



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Discuss this Article

  • Harry on April 23, 2002
    Also thier is the robotics trip to flordia that leaves today april 23. Granted it dosn't affect as many students. Finally how do you vote abbsente?
  • mathwin on April 23, 2002
    Great-now do follow up. See if some students could not vote because of the conflicts and see who schduled what when.
  • Mr Newby on April 23, 2002
    The SMOB voting ends Wed 4/24 at 2:10 pm. Anyone who did NOT get to vote for SMOB may come during their lunch period on Wednesday.
  • Nichole Kim on April 23, 2002
    I voted today and I never saw the video of the candidates. The video was never shown on Friday morning in my social studies class. I had to vote without knowing anything about the candidates other than their names.
  • Jeremy Hoffman on April 23, 2002
    Mr. Newby, do you foresee a problem of several hundred students trying to vote at the same time? Or is the electronic voting fast enough that it won't be a problem. I won't have English until 6th period tomorrow... I can't wait to use the high-tech voting booths.
  • Maria on April 26, 2002
    Ummmm.... well I agree with Nichole. I didn't get to see the videos either. And I voted on name only, and that one of the candidates twitched his eyes everytime he talked... Perhaps we should have shown the video once all over the school.
  • Stuart on April 26, 2002
    Like many students, I did not get to see the video of the candidates before my class was scheduled to vote. For this reason, I did what responsible voter should do in such a situation and I did not vote. If you don't know anything about the candidates whatsoever, you have no business voting.
  • Jeremy Hoffman on April 26, 2002
    No way, Stuart. You should do one of three things:

    1) Flip a coin
    2) Choose the person whose name you like better
    3) Vote for whoever your friend votes for

    Keep the democratic spirit going!
  • mathwin on April 30, 2002
    update! We don't want to refer to "future events" that are now in the past. Also let's advertise in the advertising section. See me.
  • Abby Graber on May 1, 2002
    I had no idea that voting was scheduled for that day, and I missed it because I was at the Olympic assembly and a part of the teasers. I also didn't know that I could have voted at lunch on Wednesday. There should have been an announcement.
  • Mr. Namffoh (View Email) on May 7, 2002
    Hey, how come Silver Chips on-line never posted the RESULTS of this student election -- perhaps a brief article including an interview with the winner about his/her plans, etc?

    Just wondering . . .
  • KliQ on May 7, 2002
    Dude, I didn't even get to vote cuz that day I was consumed in classwork-sorry.
  • mathwin on May 14, 2002
    re front page-we must have stories going as far down on the page as pics
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