Democracy: just one of the many important ties that bind the United States together as a nation. Freedom shows its democratic pride every year by providing students with the right to elect class officers for Student Government. Recent elections have locked in each class with four representatives: a treasurer, secretary, vice president, and president. Underclassmen elections were first, and freshmen and sophomore students hit the polls to determine their leaders. Results for the class of 2014 were Nicole Cummins for treasurer, Ryan Whipple for secretary, GiGi Deweese as vice president, and Aaron McSorley as president. Sophomores chose Wes Roberts as their treasurer, Sarah Choflet as secretary, Zoe Sayre for vice president, and Zac Wilson as their president. The junior class elections were polled at a later date, and resulted in Alexis Crossland as treasurer, Sarah Allego as secretary, Alexis Challis as the vice president, and Keith Braun as their president. Braun will be making a short speech at the 2011 graduation ceremony by excepting the “class key” from the senior class president. As for the senior class officers, things were done a little differently. Dr. Staub studied techniques from many successful high schools and found that all of them had very strong student governments. He would like to bring that to Freedom, and did so by requiring that every officer creates a poster to advertise their campaign, and that they must make a speech in front of the senior class. “This is a baby step towards a real active student government,” Dr. Staub said. On Thursday, September 16, the six students campaigning for positions in the senior class student government made their speeches. First up were the competitors for treasurer, Lizz Reese and Erika Woelper. Both made their mark; Reese preached her many years of experience in student government, Woelper using two fellow classmates as “body guards” to prove her point. In the end, Reese won over at the polls; “I enjoy the responsibility,” Reese said. For the positions of secretary and vice president, there was no competition, literally. Shannon Schimmer, running for secretary, and Justin Baumiller, who claimed to “cure the common cold” as vice president, were both elected to their desired positions, with no competitors to stop them. Ian Lint and Christian Beck were running against each other for the position of president of the class of 2011. Both made trying cases, but it was Beck who won over the votes by encouraging the popular idea of having the Senior Banquet on the Gateway Clipper, and promising responsibility for class reunions.