At long last, the big day has arrived! The 2011 Youth Tour’s trip to Washington D.C.! It all started several months ago, when I wrote an essay and entered the Cuivre River Electric Cooperative Youth Tour Contest.
My essay was one of twelve papers selected by a panel of judges, and I was invited to attend the Final Competition and Awards Banquet with the other eleven finalists. I was very nervous about presenting my speech about “Cooperative Values at Work in My Community” to a room full of people, but at least my parents were there to provide moral support…Even my little sister! To my surprise, my name was announced as one of the six students selected as the 2011 CREC Youth Tour Delegates! I still can’t believe that I have been given this opportunity by my local electric cooperative. Thank you Cuivre River!
“Welcome to the Youth Tour. You are now officially on your way to Washington, D.C. and the trip of a lifetime”, commented Lonnie Tucker as we pulled out of the McDonald’s in Warrenton after picking up Emily, Jill and myself (Dana). Lonnie is the Youth Tour Coordinator for Cuivre River, and our chaperone for tonight’s Missouri Youth Tour Banquet in Jefferson City and went to Washington, D.C. five years ago with my sister’s Youth Tour group. This is the first time our group... Christian, Dana, Emily, Jill, Oliver and I (Jazmin) have been together since the CREC Final Competition and Awards Banquet. We are so excited and can’t wait to get to Jefferson City to meet the other Youth Tour Delegates!
Our first stop on the Youth Tour was the Missouri State Capitol in Jefferson City. Lonnie made arrangements with Laura Hengstenberg and Cheri Schuette of Crawford Electric Cooperative to meet Shelly St. Clair, the administrative assistant to State Representative Sylvester Taylor II, for our group to receive an exclusive behind the scenes tour of the capitol. Mrs. St. Clair is really cool and offered us some ice cold bottled water the electric cooperatives had provided. Thank you Cuivre River and Crawford! I (Jazmin) needed that... We met our first Youth Tour Delegates Hannah, Katie and Nicole on the tour. They are from Crawford Electric Cooperative which is located in Bourbon, Missouri.
Our next stop on the tour was the Whispering Gallery located in the lower portion of our State Capitol’s dome some 200 feet above the floor. Stay away from the rail if you are afraid of heights! Mrs. St. Clair explained that the shape of the dome adds a certain acoustic element that allows an individual to whisper and his or her voice will travel around the dome to another individual on the domes opposite side.
Everybody had to try this… Oliver walked to the other side of the Wispering Gallery and started talking to the wall. Not like that silly! Oliver was talking and his voice was traveling around the wall to us on the other side and you could hear it clearly. Pssst. Can you hear me Jazmin? Can you hear me now… Wow! It really works!
Onward and upward. The next stop on our State Capitol tour topped everything… literally! The top of the State Capitol. 238 feet to be exact. The view of Jefferson City and the Missouri River was incredible. We took about five hundred pictures to remember this particular moment of our Youth Tour. I (Jazmin) just wish the weather would have been better. It's like a hundred degrees outside and the wind is going crazy so we had to go back inside.
Thanks again to Mrs. St. Clair for the bottled water. We needed that after climbing a thousand steps on our way to the top of the Missouri Capitol. I (Emily) could have stayed out there all day. Do you know the name of the figure on top of the Missouri Capitol? It's a hard one... Ceres. The goddess of agriculture. Now you know!
We visited the office of Robin Carnahan, the Secretary of State, and learned about the history of our Missouri State Seal and the unique press that holds the seal. Each delegate was given the opportunity to use the press to create an official Missouri State Seal as a souvenir. That was fun! The girls ruled the pressing while Christian nearly put a hole in the Secretary of State’s wall.
We then got to go into Secretary of State Carnahan's office. Wow! I loved her office. Especially the cow skin rug on the wood floor. Even the door handles have The Great Seal of Missouri hand worked into the brass. I (Dana) liked the Marie Byrum document. She was the first Missouri woman to vote on August 31, 1920.
We got to visit both the Senate and House Chambers. Mrs. St. Clair explained the process of a typical Missouri Senate and House of Representatives meeting, and the traditions and rules that apply during these meetings. I (Emily) feel sorry for the new Representatives. They get placed in the front of the House Chamber. A lot like the freshman in our classes! Jill and I (Jazmin) remember how that felt.
Mrs. St. Clair also explained the differences between the House and the Senate. Did you know that the House is made up of 163 Representatives while there are 34 Senators. I did not know that!
Visiting our Missouri Capitol was a wonderful experience. I can’t believe how beautiful it truly is with all of the murals and architecture. I am proud to call myself a Missourian. We said “Good Bye” to Mrs. St. Clair and our new friends from Crawford Electric.
Next stop… Central Dairy! Home to the best ice cream in the world! I (Jazmin) had the birthday cake flavor and Dana had vanilla. Emily’s chocolate cone was huge! That was the largest single scoop of ice cream I have ever seen. We had a great time and met Heather Hoflander and the Youth Tour delegates Courtney, Dakota and Kaylee from West Central Electric Cooperative in Higginsville, Missouri. That was fun!
I’ll admit it. I was a tad overwhelmed when I first walked into the Truman Hotel’s lobby in Jefferson City. There were dozens of high school students — 85 to be exact — from all over the Show-Me State. Like me, they’d each won their local cooperative’s Youth Tour essay competition and a right to go on the trip. Naturally, everyone is so excited about the opportunity to travel and see everything in Washington, D.C. Lonnie introduced us to Mike Marsch, the Youth Tour Director, and the Youth Tour chaperones at registration. He said Mike Marsch is the Clark Kent of the Association of Missouri Electric Cooperatives. Mike is really cool and we can't wait to get started!
After receiving our information packets and room keys we checked into our rooms and met our new roommates for the week. Cool! We talked for about 30 minutes then somebody smelled food… It must be 6:30 p.m. Time for the Missouri Youth Tour Banquet! This was the first time all 85 delegates were in the same room together. Everyone was very excited. Lonnie introduced us to several cooperative employees and their delegates.
Mike started the night off by showing a slide presentation about the historic sites we’ll see over the next couple days. The presentation was a lot of fun and there were several pictures of Mike and Lonnie that made us laugh. These guys are the greatest! I’m glad Mike will be showing us around in Washington, D.C.
Mike introduced Emily Stumpe, last year’s Youth Leadership Council delegate, and she told us about her experiences in Washington D.C. This trip really sounds too good to be true! She encouraged us to meet others and savor everything. Emily Stumpe also told us to say “Thank You” our local cooperatives for giving us the trip of a lifetime. Thank you to Cuivre River and each member for giving us this opportunity.
Once the banquet was over, we changed into some more comfortable clothes and reconvened for our orientation. Everyone was super exited! I can already tell this is going to be a great group. Mike went over the ground rules and made sure everyone was crystal clear about these policies. After that we played an icebreaker game in which you had to find 21 different people to sign their names next to a particular question in order to get to know the other delegates.
This was a blast! Who has blue eyes? Who has more than five brothers or sisters? Who lives on a farm? Who has braces? Can somebody just sign my paper! Thanks Madeline Mertgen from Florance, Missouri! Then they split us up into teams and had us build an electric cooperative. Yeah, that’s what I said, too. But that’s what they did. The chaperones passed out cardboard boxes, string, little sticks, paper clips and clay and told us to build a model showing how we thought an electric cooperative system was connected.
Of course, none of really knew what we were doing, but together we worked it out and got pretty close. I’m sure Mike and the chaperones thought this game would help us learn about our cooperative, but what it really did was help us make new friends. When our team sat down at that table, we were all shy and nervous about talking to each other. When we got up from the table we were friends.
We got back to our rooms around 11:30 p.m. My roommates Nate Christeson from Cabool and I (Christian) stayed up and talked for several hours. He seems pretty cool, which is good since I’m going to be sleeping in the same room with him for the next couple nights.
Before falling asleep, I couldn’t help but think about the upcoming week. What can I expect? Who will I meet? What might I learn about this country or myself? Oh well, I guess I’ll find out tomorrow. Until then…
