After more than a month of preparation and meetings with Terry Walker (IUSD Superintendent), the IUSD executive team, as well as the IUSD Board of Education, the selected students traveled virtually to Sacramento on March 8th and 9th to meet with the California Legislators. During their two days of meetings, the students met with Erika Hoffman (Legislative Advocate – California School Boards Association), Kevin Gordon (President of Capitol Advisors Group), State Senator Dave Min (D-37), Assemblywoman Cottie Petrie-Norris (D-74), and Assemblyman Steven Choi (R-68) to discuss various topics including mental health, social justice and diversity, the impact of Covid-19, learning loss, school funding, and more.

The students were also given the option of attending a Senate Education Committee meeting in which two of the students chose to participate and make comments during the public comment period.

Lastly, the students had the opportunity to connect with members of the Legislative Analyst’s office in a smaller group for more intimate discussions on topics related to Public Education. Some of the comments made by the LAO representative after the meeting were:

“Thank you! I feel 1000x better after interacting with such amazing students!” “Always a good time and so refreshing to listen to students’ perspectives.” “It was very enjoyable and I learned a lot!” “The IUSD students are rock stars!” 

These students represented the district with the utmost professionalism and erudition.