Kid Governor® is a national award-winning civics program for 5th graders created by the Connecticut Democracy Center (CTDC) in 2015. Timed to coincide with Election Day in November, the program offers schools the opportunity to enter one student candidate into a statewide election that other 5th graders vote in. Classes can vote in the election, nominate a classmate to run for office, or both! Toolkits of in-class lessons guide teachers and students through the program.
Kid Governor candidates work with their classmates to create a campaign video outlining:
- Why they want to be their state’s Kid Governor
- Their leadership qualities and skills
- A community issue that they want to address and why it’s important
- A three-point plan that will help 5th graders across their state make a difference on that issue.
From the pool of candidates, an Advisory Committee of civics and education professionals chooses the final seven candidates and their videos are posted online. During the Statewide Election, timed to coincide with the state’s other November elections, registered classes watch and analyze the campaign videos and vote for the platform and candidate they want to support. The candidate with the most votes statewide is then named Kid Governor.
The winning candidate serves a full-year term with all the benefits and responsibilities of being Kid Governor. These duties include creating videos to share with constituents and other students about his/her community issue, maintaining a blog about his/her community issue and actions being taken by students state wide to make a difference, meeting and speaking with students and adults across the state, participating in programs with their state’s Kid Governor affiliate program, and having a special Kid Governor Office.
For more about how your fifth grade class can participate in Kid Governor, please visit the How to Participate page.