February 29, 2024
By Landry Brewer
Elk City High School senior Jackson Ivester recently spent a week at the Capitol in Oklahoma City learning the art of legislating.
Ivester served as a page for the state Senate from Monday, February 12 through Thursday, February 15.
Ivester’s sponsoring senator was Brent Howard—who represents Oklahoma’s Senate District 38, which includes Elk City—but he worked for any senator who needed him.
“I would mostly run errands for senators, but I learned a lot about the process of lawmaking,” Ivester said.
In addition to his daily work, he and his fellow Senate Pages also participated in Pageville, a fictitious community for which the teenagers acted as legislators. The pages met on the Senate floor for a mock session, and Ivester spoke in support of a bill that he authored.
“We followed Senate procedure, and it was really cool,” Ivester said.
One of the senators advised the pages that if they want to go into politics, they should major in History or English in college. “He said you gotta know a lot of history, and you gotta do a lot of writing,” Ivester said.
Fittingly, Ivester is taking two college classes from SWOSU at Elk City High School this semester—a History class and an English Composition class.
The ECHS senior plans to attend the University of Oklahoma in Norman in the fall, though he hasn’t yet chosen a major.
Ivester thoroughly enjoyed his page experience. “It was great—I’d recommend it to everybody,” he said.
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