Trump wins!

Columbia Falls junior high students held a mock election last week.

They like Trump, or at least more than Hillary Clinton.

With 60 percent of the votes, Trump, a Republican, was the clear winner. Democrat Hillary Clinton had 32 percent of the votes, while Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein took 5 percent and 4 percent, respectively. All told, 325 students voted in the election.

In other mock election results, incumbent Democrat Steve Bullock was victorious with 52 percent of the votes for governor, beating out Republican Greg Gianforte (33 percent) and Libertarian Ted Dunlap (15 percent) by a significant margin.

Incumbent Republican Congressman Ryan Zinke was elected by the students, with 65 percent of votes cast for him. Similar to the Presidential race, there was a wide margin between the winner and Democrat Denise Juneau (25 percent) and Libertarian Rick Breckenridge (10 percent).

The election, hosted nationally, was promoted by student news organization Channel One, said seventh-grade social studies teacher DeWayne Padgett.

Channel One, during the election season, has been providing political coverage called One Vote.

Throughout the school year, Channel One has broached various issues that have come up in the election. A panel of students is interviewed, and sound bites or footage of speeches by the candidates offer insight into their stances on these issues.

Tuesday’s mock election included an exit poll asking students what they thought was the single most important issue in this election. Of the 310 students who responded, 29 percent of students pointed to terrorism as the biggest issue. Gun control was a close second at 22 percent. Immigration and education were a tight race at 12 and 11 percent, respectively. Broken government (9 percent), civil rights and social issues (8 percent), climate change (6 percent), foreign policy (2 percent), and jobs and trade (1 percent) shared the remainder of votes. Income inequality received no votes.

“What was pretty telling was what issues most concerned them,” said eighth grade social studies teacher Jeff Peck. “They’re concerned about the safety of Americans.”

“The kids get more worked up about some issues than others,” 6th grade social studies teacher Kami Heinz said. Heinz explained that some issues, like foreign policy, are harder to grasp, while students more quickly understand issues like gun control or terrorism.

Peck explained that in preparation to vote, the students had to track the issues. Students were given an “issue tracking sheet” where they recorded the issue, Clinton’s position, Trump’s position, and then their own opinion. This sheet was then used to “register” them to vote.

The political spectrum was also discussed in social studies classes, and in Peck’s class students did a variety of activities to understand where their values and beliefs lined up on that spectrum.

Peck said these activities started a dialogue.

“The kids that voted were acquainted [with the issues],” Peck said.

Among the crowd of kids voting were seventh graders Mae Anderson and Madeline Robison.

“I think it’s cool,” Robison said. “It makes me feel a little more important.”

“You get your own say,” Anderson added. “Everybody usually just follows their parents.”

Having seen the newscasts from Channel One, “now we can come up with our own opinions,” Robison said.

Both girls said that the Channel One coverage didn’t change their opinions, but bolstered the ideas they already had.

“What I saw supported my opinion,” Anderson said,

“I had some idea, but now I know what my position is. It didn’t change, but it made my opinion stronger,” Robison said.

“I’m hopeful that there’s still a connectivity between issues, [the students’] awareness of the issues, and where government officials are headed,” Peck said. “I’d like to say they do it because they’re informed.”

“One of the coolest things to come out of it was [students] understanding that we get to have these discussions, that we live in a representative democracy and we have a choice in leadership,” he added.

Peck also emphasized tolerance in his class discussions.

“Your opinion is your opinion, and you have to be able to exercise tolerance, that was big lesson,” Peck said. “Your political identity is yours and no one else’s.”