Day 4 (6/21/23)

                                                 CAPITAL HILL DAY👇

Joke of the Day: Why did the secret service bring a herd of cows to the White House? They were trying to beef up security

6:45am came early when everyone met in the hotel lobby wearing their red polo and kaki pants ready to take on Capital Hill. We went to the Joni Ernst Constituent Coffee right after breakfast and received a talk from her and took a group photo. She even wore one of our corn necklaces! After that, each kid got their own picture, as well as kids from the same CO-OP. The weather was not the best, as students wore their ponchos and umbrellas 24/7.

Next, each kid saw their House of Representatives from their own division. Pictured is Randy Feenstra and the students from division 4. After lunch, we met up with Senator Chuck Grassley, who we originally going to go on a run with him this morning, but he had hip surgery a while ago. It is always fun listening to them talk to our high school group. 

The capital tour was next on the agenda and it was super cool to hear all about it and see the statues and paintings. We had an audio tour, which is helpful when the Capital is full of people.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum was next and it turned everyone silent. The pictures and videos were so horrendous that your stomach twisted. It was good to see the students acknowledge everything they saw, but hard to not un-see those pictures in your head. 

The last part of the day was Youth Day. This happened on the bottom floor of our hotel, where all the Youth Tour kids ate, traded pins, danced, and listened to a few speakers. We listened to a guy from the Iowa Lakes talks about his project with electricity to Guatemala. Next, was a student talking about her trip to America from Iraq, and last was Mike Schlappi who is a keynote speaker. Mike was paralyzed by his best friend who accidentally shoots him and turned to win gold and bronze medal in the Olympics in wheelchair basketball. 

Students had the rest of the time to party and on the dance floor before 10:15pm room check.

Goodnight DC!