Woburn Advocate – April 30, 2009

Woburn, MA -  Twenty-six high school students who may some day direct the workings of city government got to try their hand at it Tuesday with the help of those who already do.

Woburn’s 56th annual Student Government Day brought the students from Woburn Memorial High School to City Hall where they participated in a mock City Council Finance Committee meeting with their real-life counterparts. Acting as city department heads and sitting in the council chambers, they presented fiscal year 2010 budget requests to the committee for discussion.

“I was very impressed with some of the answers the students gave to questions from veteran elected officials who were sitting at the dais,” Mayor Thomas L. McLaughlin said later.

City Clerk William Campbell, who also worked with one of the students, said the annual event “gives an awareness to the students about what goes on in that building with the white columns… It could be their first step toward a career in government service.”

The students, ranging from freshmen to seniors, were chosen on the basis of essays submitted to the high school English department.

Following the mock meeting, the Rotary Club hosted the students at a luncheon where Middlesex District Attorney Gerard T. Leone Jr., addressed them about “the little decisions” they make that can “make a difference in someone’s life, and a difference in your school.”

“While you may not get rich like you could in a number of other jobs,” Leone said, “I’ve committee my career to public service and I can tell you that there is no more professionally satisfying thing you can do than to go to work every day to help others who truly need it.”

The day ended with a mayor’s dinner at the Crestview Restaurant.

Participating students included: Melissa Lake, Gina Mantica, Marissa Callahan, Alison Leonard, Maura Connolly, Giuliana Malvarosa, Ashley Power, Brianna Walsh, Keriann MacDonald, Colleen O’Melia, Troy Welton, Sara Wachendorf, Patrick Raistrick, Shalen Lowell, Alan Cheung, Shauna Fumicello, Hunter Romano, Theresa Girardi, Pamela Holland, Kevin Casey, Nasir Khalifa, Bhavesh Patel, Mike Nowosielski