How student governments should work

In a sense, student governments in schools are meant as a way to help students to understand how government works in general. You elect representatives who make decisions on behalf of the rest of their classes. Unfortunately, the schools set up these student governments in ways that keep them from having much practical value.


Among the problems is that student governments typically have teachers or people like them overseeing the process. At the very least, the schools create rules that ensure students do not develop too much power. In order for a student government to have value, this kind of oversight needs to be minimized.

One thing that I remember from my school years was an insistence that class representatives needed to maintain high enough grade levels. The general idea is that they didn't want the extra work to get in the way of grades, and to motivate individuals to keep up performances if they want the benefits from representing their class.

Their is one enormous problem with this approach. It guarantees that the class is represented by students who perform well as things already are. Individuals who have legitimate problems that they would like to fix are effectively being silenced. Grades absolutely should not be required for anyone who wants to join a student government.