William & Mary Model Congress Blog

Interest meeting!

2009-09-08T23:50:00.002-04:00

So we had our first interest meeting today in the Sadler Center's James Room. Except for the fact that I did not prepare any specific speech and felt ridiculous as I did my usual spiel of words, I think we got some pretty cool people.

Out of the 14 or so people there, a good many had had Model Congress experience before, and most had been familiarized with Robert's Rules of Order.

After a quick briefing on what our club was about, we went into some descriptions of positions available such as conference leadership positions and committee chairmanships and then broke into groups to discuss those positions further.

The treasurer also discussed club dues, which will be in the amount of $5 this year and should be paid fairly soon. The executive staff felt this was a good number given the fees that we would have to incur on ourselves throughout the course of the year.

Those in attendance were the Treasurer, the executive directors of the Conference, along with myself. The vice-president was unfortunately unable to attend due to a Student Assembly meeting that was going on at the same time.

I'd also like to note that we are now officially part of the William and Mary website under the government department directory! You can find us on the WM website here.

I'd like to extend a warm welcome to all the new members of the club, and would like to say that William and Mary Model Congress is glad to see people interested in keeping the tradition alive and well at the College of William and Mary. Looks like we'll be having one heck of a year!

Signing off for now,
Isshin Teshima
President
William and Mary Model Congress

Club Meeting

2009-10-19T00:30:00.006-04:00

Hey guys,

Isshin here, blogging again, this time about the recent club meeting we had.

In terms of the agenda, some of the more important items included getting organized for the upcoming James Blair Middle School Model Congress conference and training our volunteers for this particular event in the art of chairing a committee.

Stef took a bit of a lead here. Being the Head Chair, we had a small approximately 8 person committee debate out some bills that we had in our conference from last year.

Even though parliamentary procedure is a bit of a hassel and complicated to go through, I think we got the general gist of how to be a chair completed at least for this session. Some of the more main key points included:

1. The responsibility of a chair is to moderate debate
2. The chair has the ability to rule things dillatory for the sake of moderating debate and keeping the floor open.
3. The chair has the role of being the "information seeker" during a conference, and making sure that bills introduced are as accurate as can be in preparation for full committee.

If there is anyone that missed this particular chair training, please let either Daniel Thorpe or Kelsi Weissgold know so that we can get the proper chair packet out to you.

After a lengthy debate about whether openly recognizing Taiwan as a nation was worth it or not for the US, we decided to call it a day.

In terms of big news in the Club Exec Board, I would also like to announce that Stef and I have decided to change our positions to better serve the club.

The James Blair program starts this Tuesday from 3-4:30. Expect some new developments and definately a blog post then!

Isshin Teshima
Vice-President
William and Mary Model Congress Club

James Blair Model Congress: Day 2

2009-10-28T17:15:00.004-04:00

So we had our second full day of the James Blair Middle School Model Congress today. There were four people in attendance due to a bout of sickness that had spread throughout the school. However, lucky for the four people, they now have a step up on parliamentary procedure and bill writing.

We first broke into committee session as we introduced for the first time the duties of the chairman, basic points and motions, and the process that a bill takes to get passed in committee. Isshin was the presiding chair for this particular committee session.

It was most definitely a lot of information to take in at one time, but as we went on and started actually doing a committee session, I think it became a little more clearer how exactly the process worked.

It took us the greater part of the hour-hour and a half we had to go over basic parliamentary procedure, things, such as the points and motions section in particular was a bunch of text on a piece of paper, which I think kind of intimidated the students. However, in the end, as we debated a bill on tobacco usage, I think they got a better feel for how points and motions are used in the process.

Next meeting, we will go more in-depth on parliamentary procedure, and start to actively use points and motions in active debate. Also, we will definitely start to have students produce their bills for presentation into the committee.

Hopefully, the sickness currently infecting a good majority of the school won't last for too much longer.

Isshin Teshima
Vice President
William & Mary Model Congress

James Blair Model Congress: Day 1

2009-10-21T03:06:00.005-04:00

Today, Tom, Daniel, I and 4 others were introduced for the first time to the middle schoolers of James Blair Middle School to teach some kids from another generation some civics. This was Day 1 of a series of after-school meetings for the James Blair Middle School Model Congress Conference (JBMCC).

JBMC had been one of the many schools that we had contacted last year for our first conference in the 'burg. After a little research, they decided that they would love for someone from our club to teach a group of students how model congress works in the form of an after-school activity.

When Jessica Taylor and I first started this club in 2008, we decided to make one of the mission statements of the club to teach civics to those who may not know much about the governmental processes in D.C., thus, I felt like this activity was one that was both appropriate and useful for this club as a whole.

In addition, it was a win-win situation, as we had some new members that also still needed to get acquainted with parliamentary procedure and how to act as a chair.

Today's meeting was fairly self-explanatory. Since it was our first, we did not want to overwhelm our students with too many words. For some reason, some of us thought that going into a middle school armed with terms such as "nuclear proliferation" and "foreign policy" and "economic/monetary stability" would be a little much. We'll get there eventually. Instead, we started them out by teaching some basic terms and basically showing how a bill becomes a law and why Model Congress exists.

We had about a group of 7 today, which is a little bit less than what we usually deal with in a committee, but certainly not to the extent that this cannot work. Perhaps by the end of these sessions, these seven will have more experience in Congressional procedure and processes than some college students I know.

Also, I'd like to give a special kudos to Matt Donohue and Jackie Goldschmidt who handled most of the speaking during today's meeting and kept the presentation rolling. Good job guys.

Next week, we'll have another meeting in which we will start talking about the types of bills that students might like to take upon themselves to research and write. It'll be interesting to see what sorts of ideas for bills these kids can come up with.

Activities Night Fair Update

2009-08-26T23:53:00.004-04:00

The club had a great time showing off to potential members at W&M Activities Night yesterday. We had a good amount of interest and hopefully many people will show up at our interest meeting September 8 at 7 PM in the James Room in the Sadler Center. Everyone who signed up or registered last year is on our new listserv: for any other student who is interested, please sign up at https://lists.wm.edu/wws/info/wmmc-staff/ to receive important updates!

The first meeting

2009-08-23T00:12:00.008-04:00

Hey guys,

Saw that this blog thing was online, and thought that I would try my hand at blogging for the first time here at William and Mary Model Congress. I guess I should start by introducing myself.

My name is Isshin Teshima, and I am the President of Model Congress and I would officially like to invite you to the first-ever William and Mary Model Congress club blog. Here, we, the officers, or sometimes even students like yourselves, may be free to post whatever kind of model congress related post that you come across.

Of course, this is the first time, that any model congress club has attempted this, so I don't exactly know how good this will turn out, but there's no hurt in trying it I guess. ^_^ Keep up with this blog for up to the minute coverage of what the club is up to!

Last week, our club held our first meeting of the 2009-2010 school year. We talked about various club matters, the most important being the ongoing planning for our next Spring semester conference. We've contacted over 150 schools for this upcoming conference, and we hope to get a lot of interest in this conference. The leadership of this club has made it its number one priority to try to make this conference different and unique, yet at the same time, we have also tried to make it a familiar conference that all members are used to.

As for club matters, we have finally scheduled a date for the initial interest meeting for this year! Here is the information on that:

2009-2010 Fall Interest Meeting
Where: Sadler Center--James Room (the last one on the right on the first floor)
When: September 8th at 7:00 p.m.

2009-2010 Fall Meeting Area
Where: Blow Memorial Hall Room 334
When: Every Saturday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Well, this is Isshin Teshima, signing out for today. Have a great weekend!

Trying out a Model Congress Blog

2009-08-17T21:40:00.004-04:00

While preparing for the new school year, conference at club staff met in Richmond. At the request of Isshin, we are going to try out this blogging updates thing. I think he's had good experience with his school-sponsored blog and wants to talk more about Model Congress.

As the conference technology officer, it's evidently my responsibility to put this thing together. :) But I won't complain. We'll see how this works out!

Snow Days at William & Mary

2010-02-10T12:11:00.005-05:00

Since we have the afternoon off due to the third snow storm this semester, I'll post a few pictures of what campus looks like. Hopefully, winter won't still be around when the conference comes in a little over a month.

William & Mary 2010 Graduation

2010-05-18T17:55:00.006-04:00

With our Class of 2010 leaving William and Mary, we wish them the best!

A sampling of the festivities from Sunday's graduation:

Senior Walk across Campus

Graduation ceremonies by department, just before the Business School program

Dates for 2011 Conference

2010-05-03T00:00:00.000-04:00

We are ready to formally announce the dates for the next William & Mary Model Congress:

In 2011, be ready to come to Williamsburg, Thursday – Friday, March 17 – 20!

2010-02-06T19:15:00.004-05:00

We just made committee assignments for all the delegates coming to this March's conference! We'll be getting them out to faculty sponsors this next week.

Be on the look out and start writing your bills.

Happy 317th birthday William & Mary (Charter Day)!